From the Liveblog of
Tuesday, February 26, 2019
EU court rules kosher meat, slaughtered without stunning, can’t be organic
Add ToI as a Preferred Source on GoogleBRUSSELS, Belgium — Kosher and halal meat from animals slaughtered by religious ritual without having first been stunned cannot be labeled organic, on animal welfare grounds, a top European Union court rules.
The way the meat is slaughtered “fails to observe the highest animal welfare standards,” says the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU).
The case came to the court after the OABA, a French association promoting animal welfare in abattoirs, urged the agriculture ministry to ban the labeling of such meat as organic.
French courts initially dismissed the OABA’s case before passing it up to the CJEU for a definitive ruling.
“The Court recalls that scientific studies have shown that pre-stunning is the technique that compromises animal welfare the least at the time of killing,” says a court statement Tuesday.
Producers have to meet the highest animal welfare standards to qualify for the EU’s organic label, the court notes.
So while the ritual slaughter of animals is allowed on grounds of religious freedom, if they were not first stunned then that did not meet the highest animal welfare standards required for organic labeling.
The case will now go back to the Court of Appeal in Versailles, France, for a definitive ruling.
— AFP
The Times of Israel Community.