Europe’s livestock sector faces heatwave reckoning after millions of chickens die

 

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 animals

Last 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.