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Written question asked by Kenny MacAskill on Tuesday, 29 June 2021, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Thursday, 1 July 2021. It was answered by Baroness Prentis of Banbury (Conservative) on Wednesday, 7 July 2021 on behalf of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.

Animals: Exports

Question

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how many animals were exported from the UK for the purpose of (a) breeding, (b) fattening and (c) slaughter in each of the last five years.

Answer

This response has been compiled by the Animal and Plant Health Agency (APHA) using data provided by third parties, and as such, is reliant on the providers for the accuracy of the information.

The following has been extracted from TRACES (Trade Control and Expert System). TRACES is a European Commission system employed by EU member states to facilitate and record animal/animal product movements into and throughout the EU.

Below is the number of live animals exported to the EU from 2016:

Reason for export

2016

2017

2018

2019

2020

Breeding

9,037,232

11,073,789

9,998,318

8,415,229

9,577,278

Fattening

93,778

92,193

76,915

80,934

87,936

Production

25,146

28,783

25,521

34,295

6,248

Slaughter

3,950,414

5,315,978

4,820,894

5,277,047

4,657,365

Exports to the rest of the world require an Export Health Certificate (EHC). APHA’s data retention period for export certification is three years. Subsequently, APHA does not hold records for export consignments carried out before 2018.

The below information shows the number of EHCs issued. The APHA records do not hold the number of animals exported; numerous animals can travel on one EHC. Many of the EHCs agreed with countries are for breeding, fattening or production combined on one document so this data cannot be segmented by export reason.

Reason for export

2018

2019

2020

Breeding/Fattening/Production

1805

1812

2185

Slaughter

227

484

263

Secondary information

Type
Written question
Reference
24344
Session
2021-22
Subjects
Animals Animal breeding Exports Slaughterhouses
Contains statistics
Yes
Link
View this Written question on www.parliament.uk