Campaigners have welcomed a government report which has conceded there is “no clear evidence” animal welfare breaches are more likely to occur during non-stun slaughter.
Commenting on the Food Standards Agency’s findings, advocacy group Shechita UK said that for too long the debate around the Jewish religious method of slaughter had been “dominated by misinformation”.
It further called on the government to reconsider its position that “it would prefer all animals to be stunned before slaughter”.
The important concession on non-stun slaughter is contained in the FSA’s latest Animal Welfare report which covers 2024/25.
The report states: “Animal Welfare Legislation permits non-stun slaughter and aims to respect religious freedoms.
“The government encourages the highest standards of animal welfare at slaughter and would prefer all animals to be stunned before slaughter but respects the rights of Jews and Muslims to eat meat prepared in accordance with their religious beliefs, which includes the use of permitted methods of non-stun slaughter.
“The FSA has no legal basis to approve a slaughterhouse based on their slaughter method. Operators may select a method in line with customer demand provided it complies with legal and religious requirements.
“Our analysis found no clear evidence that animal welfare breaches are more or less likely to occur during non-stun slaughter compared to stunned slaughter.”
Shechita requires animals not to have anything regarded as a “blemish” prior to slaughter – ruling out the different forms of stunning, which cause significant brain damage before the slaughter itself in an attempt to ensure the animal feels no pain while it is being killed.
Shechita UK, which says shechita is “an absolute necessity for Jewish life in the UK”, has worked closely with the FSA and the Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA).
Shimon Cohen, Campaign Director of Shechita UK, said: “We welcome the Food Standards Agency putting the evidence clearly on the record.
“For far too long, the debate around shechita has been dominated by misinformation and by the deeply misleading distinction between ‘stunned’ and ‘non-stunned’ slaughter, as though one were inherently humane and the other inherently cruel.
“In fact, shechita conforms to the legal definition of stunning itself: ‘any intentionally induced process which causes loss of consciousness and sensibility without pain, including any process resulting in instantaneous death’.
“Shechita stuns, dispatches and exsanguinates in one action, bringing about the rapid and irreversible loss of consciousness. Recent peer-reviewed scientific research has further strengthened the evidence for this.
“Shechita should not be regarded merely as a derogation granted to Jews from some supposedly superior standard of animal welfare. Shechita is itself a humane method of slaughter.”
He added: “The government continues to state that it ‘would prefer all animals to be stunned before slaughter’. In light of the accumulating scientific evidence, and now the FSA’s own statement, we believe the time has come for the government to reconsider that position.”
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