Monday’s event focused on labour and the meat industry. This session was a transnational conversation and featured speakers from Canada, Germany, and the Netherlands, who compared ways that the meat industry and labour has changed since the Coronavirus pandemic and identified continuing roadblocks to improving labour conditions and animal welfare in the meat industry.

Sarah Berger Richardson (University of Ottawa Faculty of Law) shared her expertise on the Canadian context in her presentation “How increasing slaughter line speeds impact worker safety and animal welfare: Reflections from the Canadian context.”

Serife Erol-Vogel ( Institute of Economic and Social Research (WSI) at the Hans Böckler Stiftung and Ruhr-University Bochum Faculty of Social Science) shared her perspective on changes in labour relations in the German meat industry.

John Klijn (Federation of Dutch Trade Unions (FNV)) presented the trade union perspective of on working conditions in the meat industry, specifically within the Netherlands

Tesseltje de Lange (Centre for Migration Law, Radboud University, Nijmegen) shared her insights on the rights of EU mobile workers in Dutch slaughterhouses, looking specifically during the pandemic and forecasting beyond these years.

You can access the presentations and (following 54:50) the lively discussion that followed by following the link to the recording below. You can also  find more information about the event, including speaker bios and abstracts on the event page linked below.

Stay tuned for information about any possible upcoming Meat the Law events! In the meantime, you can also see many other upcoming ACT events, several of which will also touch on sustainability on our events page.