The Food Standards Agency (FSA) is encouraging slaughterhouses in the UK to use CCTV to monitor animal welfare in their plants.

A paper, which will be presented to the FSA Board next week, proposes the use of CCTV as part of a range of safeguards to ensure the highest standards of animal welfare are met in slaughterhouses.

In June 2010, around seven per cent of slaughterhouses had CCTV installed for monitoring animal welfare in the stunning/slaughter area, with eight per cent having CCTV in place for monitoring animal welfare in other areas. Currently, 19 per cent of red meat and 29 per cent of white meat slaughterhouses are equipped with CCTV to monitor animal welfare.

The FSA said the increase in uptake had been driven in part by individual businesses and in part by the major retailers, through their assurance schemes. Asda, Morrisons, J Sainsbury, Tesco, Marks & Spencer, Iceland, The Co-operative and Waitrose now all require CCTV monitoring of animals at slaughter throughout their supply chains.

An FSA spokesperson said the agency was “encouraged though that the number of businesses with CCTV in place for animal welfare has more than doubled since June 2010.” There have been widespread calls for the use of CCTV to ensure best practice, following investigations by groups including Animal Aid.

Between 2009 and 2011, Animal Aid reported on secret filming it had conducted inside nine British slaughter houses; breaches were recorded in eight, with one being so serious the slaughterhouse was forced to close down. In July this year, the animal rights organisation pushed for its footage to be admissible as evidence in prosecuting slaughterers filmed seriously mistreating animals in Essex.