by Joshua Poole
France’s late-June heatwave killed an estimated 2.5 million to 3 million broiler chickens, according to Le Monde,
with Brittany among the worst-hit regions. The scale of mortality
overwhelmed rendering services and forced authorities to allow emergency
on-farm burial in some cases, turning the heatwave into an animal
welfare crisis and a logistical emergency for farmers.
The
heatwave’s impact extended beyond France. In Belgium, farmers warned
that cows and pigs were suffering heat stress, reducing feed intake,
milk yields, and growth rates. The rolling effects are expected to result in losses for dairy and meat production.
The deaths have opened a wider debate
over how European livestock farming can protect animals and farmers from
climate extremes, while also cutting the emissions that help drive
those extremes.
Climate change-driven heatwaves
World
Weather Attribution, an international scientific collaboration that
studies the influence of climate change on extreme weather events, says
this heatwave would have been “virtually impossible” 50 years ago
without human-caused climate change.
The
organization concluded that climate change is “unequivocally to blame”
for its severity. It says a similar heatwave in 1976 would have been
about 3.5°C cooler, and that the overnight temperatures experienced in
Western Europe in the final week of June are about 100 times more likely
today than during the 2003 European heatwave.
We
spoke with World Weather Attribution, which told us that Europe’s
infrastructure, including farms and animal housing systems, was largely
built for cooler historical conditions. This means Europe’s increasingly
frequent heatwaves are a growing concern for animal welfare and
livestock farmers.
Heatwave hell for farmed animalsLast year, Compassion in World Farming released a report
on how climate change-linked extreme weather impacts farmed animals.
The report says that heat stress can seriously harm livestock, causing
breathing and heart problems, dehydration, weaker immunity, reduced
fertility, lower milk production — and in severe cases, death.
“Factory
farming contributes significantly to climate change, and, as
temperatures rise, animals trapped in factory farms suffer even more,”
Compassion in World Farming tells Food Ingredients First.
“Millions of animals are confined in overcrowded sheds, left without
enough water, and transported in vehicles where temperatures can become
dangerously high.”
Brittany’s
agriculture authority has reported significant deaths as a result of
June’s heatwave, mainly on poultry farms. It has fast-tracked burial
exemptions for farms hit by mass poultry or pig mortalities and expects a
return to “normal collection and processing capacities” in early July.
European Livestock Voice responds
We
also spoke with Anton van den Brink, chair of European Livestock Voice,
a Brussels-based livestock-sector coalition. Van den Brink accepts that
the livestock sector is both vulnerable to climate-driven heatwaves and
a contributor to the emissions driving them.
“But
the discussion needs to be fair and practical,” he tells us. He refers
to a leaked draft of the EU Livestock Strategy, expected to be published
this week, which suggests EU livestock accounts for 8% of total
emissions in the EU (66% of agricultural emissions), around 4% of global
agriculture emissions, and less than 1% of global total emissions.
“Livestock
farmers are on the frontline of climate change: heatwaves directly
affect animal welfare, productivity, farm workers, feed availability,
and farm economics. At the same time, livestock production has
emissions, and the sector accepts its responsibility to reduce them,”
says van den Brink.
The transition
to more sustainable livestock farming should be done, van den Brink
says, through innovation, efficiency, and investment — not by pushing
production out of Europe. “The worst outcome would be to weaken European
farmers, while increasing imports from regions with lower standards,”
he says.
Preparing for future heatwaves
Compassion
in World Farming has called for robust emergency protections ahead of
further heatwaves. These include reliable access to water, lower
stocking densities, good ventilation, and restrictions on transporting
animals during extreme heat.
Commercial broiler farming, it adds, should urgently transition to slower-growing breeds, which are more resilient in higher temperatures.
¨Although these measures will help in the short term, the long-term
solution is to move away from factory farming toward higher-welfare,
more resilient farming systems that are better for animals, people, and
the planet,” the NGO says
For European Livestock Voice, the question is how to support a more adaptable, lower-emission livestock sector.
“Adaptation
has to become part of everyday farm management. This includes better
ventilation and cooling systems, shade, access to water, adjusted
feeding strategies, heat-resilient housing design, early-warning
systems, contingency planning, and investment in animal health and
welfare monitoring,” says van den Brink.
Costly business for farmers
However, transitioning to more climate-resilient farming is expensive, cautions van den Brink.
“Farmers
cannot be expected to carry the full burden alone, especially when many
are already under severe economic pressure. Public policy must support
investment in climate-resilient farms through targeted funding, faster
permits, practical guidance, and research that works under real farm
conditions.”
He says a “sensible
approach” includes improving feed efficiency, animal health, breeding,
manure management, renewable energy use, precision farming, and circular
use of resources.
The deaths in
France reveal that extreme heat is testing the limits of Europe’s
livestock systems. The question now is whether farms can adapt quickly
enough to protect animals and farmers, while also reducing the sector’s
contribution to the warming that is making such heatwaves more severe.
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