Animal welfare: Time to be considered, considerate

THE link between the very welcome news that there has been a 25% fall in the number of dogs destroyed in Irish pounds in the last year and a cattle feedlot in Broken Bow, Nebraska, one that can accommodate up to 85,000 cattle at any one time, may seem tenuous but the same issue is at the core of both figures: Animal welfare and the code of ethics we apply when dealing with domestic animals — how we treat the inhabitants of this planet that we fawn over or may eventually eat.

As the world’s human population accelerates at a rate that seems unsustainable — up from 3.3bn in 1965 to 7.3bn today — our need to produce more and more affordable food will mean ever more industrialised food production and farming methods.

The swelling middle classes in China, Russia, India and Brazil can only add to that momentum as affluence changes diets.