“With this strike by vets during this festive period, we will either not have enough slaughters to get piglets or goats on our tables, or we will have to buy meat from slaughterhouses in Spain,” APIC warned in a statement.
In the note, signed by the association’s executive director, Graça Mariano, the meat producers stressed that the strike has “serious consequences” for businessmen, stressing that they pay an examination fee “more than enough to support a sufficient number of doctors and veterinarians to perform health inspection functions”.
Workers in public positions, including health inspectors, will strike from December 19 to 30.
In this sense, according to the association, the General Directorate of Food and Veterinary Medicine (DGAV) has sent a fax to slaughterhouses so that they can take precautions in the field of animal welfare.
The association recalled that there were several strikes during the year, which created further difficulties for companies, although it noted that it is not against the strike.
However, APIC expressed its “total dissatisfaction” that, despite contacting DGAV, the Ministry of Agriculture and Food, and Prime Minister António Costa’s office, it has not received any answers to this issue.
As he noted, without DGAV or local veterinarians, no slaughter can take place and, if the limit is reached, the operator could commit a crime against public health, “considering the clandestine slaughter, which is punishable by imprisonment”.
The association recalled that the health inspection takes place after payment by the industrialists of a fee to the state, which in some cases can reach 35,000 euros per month, depending on the volume of slaughter.
On the other hand, he regrets that restrictions on the normal functioning of slaughterhouses have persisted for several years, as DGAV does not have enough veterinarians and is also unable to hire more professionals on its own.
According to the same note, DGAV has thus resorted to the cooperation of municipal councils, but it has not been possible to guarantee the “normal functioning” of the slaughtering industries.
In fact, operators have adapted their working hours to the availability of health inspectors who, on successive occasions, either do not perform the second shift or do not slaughter at all on the scheduled days. This lack of health inspectors seriously harms economic operators as they have not ensured their normal activities,” he added.
On December 9, the association sent a letter to the Ministry of Agriculture and another to the Prime Minister’s office, saying that this sector had been “forgotten and mistreated” by the government, asking for measures to allow slaughterhouses to do their job .
Source: DN
