Factory farming exposed: 9 Spanish pig farms investigated
Animal Equality has released an investigation exposing pig farming in Spain’s Aragón region. On the nine farms investigated, we found severe violations of animal protection laws. Now, we're fighting back against this cruelty with a legal complaint.
*The findings*
*Dead and dying piglets:* Bodies piled in corridors and wheelbarrows, and decomposing piglets found inside mothers’ drinking troughs.
*Newborn suffering:* Many piglets died within hours of birth due to lack of oxygen. Some were found still covered in placenta behind their mothers.
*Extreme breeding practices:* Mother pigs were bred to produce oversized litters leaving many newborns to starve. Some desperate piglets attempted to nurse from their mothers’ genitals or backs.
*Severe injuries and untreated illness:* Pigs suffered from tumors, infections, lameness, labored breathing, and large wounds filled with dirt or pus. Investigators also documented severe uterine prolapses.
*Illegal and botched mutilations:* Despite an EU ban on routine tail docking, nearly all pigs had their tails cut off without anesthesia. Buckets filled with severed tails and testicles were found, along with filthy mutilation tools left on floors covered in blood, dirt, and feces.
*Extreme confinement:* Mother pigs were kept for months in cages so small they could not turn around. Many bit the metal bars until their mouths bled and developed cuts, abrasions, and boils from the crates.
*ABOUT ANIMAL EQUALITY*
Animal Equality is an international animal protection organization working in eight countries to end cruelty to farmed animals.
We expose abuse inside factory farms through undercover investigations and use this evidence to:
• Strengthen animal protection laws
• Hold corporations accountable
• Encourage plant-based alternatives
*HOW YOU CAN TAKE ACTION*
▶ Subscribe for investigations & updates: youtube.com/@animalequality
▶ Donate to protect animals: https://ae.onl/donate-to-end-cruelty
▶ Join as an Animal Protector: https://ae.onl/join
▶ Explore plant-based eating with Love Veg: https://ae.onl/try-veg
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Transcript (English — en)
Obtaining the greatest economic profit at
the lowest cost. This is the principle by which
the agricultural industry operates. Behind
this logic are lives condemned from
birth. A new Animal Equality
investigation filmed in nine
pig farms in Aragón, reveals the
serious consequences of this model.
This industry treats mother pigs like production machines, encouraging them to have more and more litters—
even if this means that many
piglets are born weak, unable to feed, and
die crushed within the first days of life.
In several of the documented farms,
the mothers simply do not have the capacity
to nurse all of their offspring. The smallest ones
fall behind, grow weaker, and die of hunger.
Some die from asphyxiation during birth. Others
agonize as their lives slowly fade, crushed
or starved to death beside their siblings.
In Spain, up to one in every five piglets
dies before reaching one week of age, not from
disease, but because of a system that aims
to produce more at any cost. Those who survive
are mutilated without anesthesia;
their tails are cut or they are castrated by hand, procedures that
are routine yet cause them intense pain.
Meanwhile, their mothers remain confined
in cages so small they can barely move.
There, they repeat desperate behaviors over and over,
such as biting the bars until their gums bleed.
Some suffer visible prolapses, while others bear the bodies
of their unborn piglets trapped in their vulva.
Spain is now the largest producer of pork
in the entire European Union. In 2024 alone, more than
53 million animals were slaughtered. Only between 1%
and 3% of farms are inspected each year.
Most of these inspections are announced in advance.
It can take up to 60 years for a farm to receive an inspection.
The authorities are aware of this situation, but
institutional responses continue to be
insufficient. Political inaction and
the support given to the industry allow
these scenes to be repeated day after day.
This is a call directed to Minister
Luis Planas. Spain cannot continue
to look the other way. It is time to
put an end to the suffering of mothers
and their young on industrial farms.