Show the European Commission that animal welfare is important

Wednesday, 23 September 2009 11:16

We need your help to tell the Commission that animal welfare is a major concern for many EU citizens.

The European Commission’s service responsible for animal welfare, DG Health and Consumer Protection (also known as SANCO) has opened a new discussion on its online public forum.

The discussion forum is asking EU citizens to comment on the EU’s Health and Consumer policy. As DG SANCO is celebrating its 10th anniversary this year, they are looking to see how the general public perceives the work it has done.

As this domain includes animal welfare, this is an excellent opportunity to emphasise the importance of animal welfare in EU legislation – to highlight some problems as well as suggest improvements.

ACTION

Please take a few minutes of time and contribute to this discussion. This forum opens the floor to anyone to comment in any way they wish and we really need to pass on the message that animal welfare matters to us. The deadline for submitting comments is just three weeks away (9 October 2009). After the 9 October deadline, the European Commission will hold a seminar on Friday 23 October for stakeholders, media, past and former Commissioners and Commission staff to discuss the messages posted.

We need to ensure that animal welfare emerges as one of the major topics of discussion of this gathering.

The questions to reply to are: Does the general public consider that EU health and consumer policy has had an impact on their lives? If so, was it helpful or did they have negative experiences? And are there still issues where the EU should intervene – or do better?

Your contributions do not necessarily need to be long or detailed, but could usefully include the following points:

• The fact that this part (Directorate General) of the Commission is responsible for animal welfare, too.
• How animal welfare matters to you and your concerns about the way farm animals are kept.
• The fact that you would like to be able to choose products of animal origin according to the way the animals have been treated and that this is not possible at the moment.
• Your main concerns (the areas where you think the EU should do more): transport of live animals, improve the welfare of animals which are farmed for food.

All you have to do is:

1. Go to: http://forums.ec.europa.eu/debateeurope/index.php?language=english
2. Change the language of the forum to your language at the top right corner of the webpage
3. If you have never before participated in the EU forum, you will need to register. This is a straightforward process similar to most other sign-up forms: go to the “register” button above the forum listing table and follow the instructions. Here are a few things that will make it easier for those unfamiliar with the process
a. Step one of registration: agree to the terms and conditions
b. Enter a username (this can be any name you choose, so do feel free to use a nickname), choose a password, answer the anti-bot question (this is to ensure that you are an actual person registering and not a software programme designed to send unwanted messages). You may choose to enter any of the other information fields, but this is not required.
c. If you have completed this, you will need to go to the inbox of the e-mail address you registered and confirm your registration by clicking on the link provided.
4. You are now registered and can log in by typing in your e-mail address and chosen password. In the forum menu, choose your language’s equivalent to “Consumer and Health”
5. The forum discussion thread you will wish to enter is named “Have your say on EU health and consumer policy” (again, in your preferred language)
6. You will now see the comments provided by other users. To enter your own comments, click on the icon “post reply”)
7. You can now write your comments in the space provided.
8. When finished, click on the “submit” button below the message window
9. You will then see a confirmation message that your message has been posted

Thank you for your contribution to this important debate.