OUR HISTORY
OVER 18 YEARS OF CHANGING THE WORLD FOR ANIMALS
Since our foundation in 2006, thousands of people have come together to change and save lives. From a handful of committed activists to a global team of tens of thousands with offices in eight countries, we have come a long way.
Here is a summary of Animal Equality’s work in the last 18 years.
2024
OCTOBER
Animal Equality delivered 100,000 signatures to Spain’s Congress, calling for an end to the force-feeding of ducks and geese for foie gras. Spain is one of only five European countries where this practice is still carried out, and this appeal urges the government to back a ban across Europe.
OCTOBER
Animal Equality’s latest investigation exposed suffering at a pig slaughterhouse in Northern Italy. Covered by a popular Italian news network, the footage prompted political leaders to push for accountability in both regional and national governments. Following the release, Animal Equality led two street demonstrations to rally public support for change.
September
Animal Equality displayed a large banner at Mexico City’s Angel of Independence and Monument to the Revolution, urging Congress to move forward with constitutional reforms that protect animals.
September
Animal Equality in the U.S. rallied support for the SAFE Act, a piece of legislation that could stop U.S. horses from being shipped abroad for slaughter. Advocates across the country wrote to their representatives and asked them to support its inclusion in the Senate’s version of the Farm Bill.
September
Drone recordings showed over a dozen fish suffocating on accredited farms supplying Marks & Spencer, Tesco, and Sainsbury’s. Prompting thought pieces in The Times and The Grocer, this sparked fresh calls for species-specific legislation in the UK.
September
A High Court judge has given Animal Equality permission to challenge the approval of the UK’s first on-land salmon mega-farm. Just 5% of cases make it this far. The farm would confine around one million fish annually, require substantial energy and freshwater, and produce significant waste, raising animal welfare and environmental concerns.
September
A court ruling that acquitted the owners of a pig farm investigated by Animal Equality has been overturned. The Provincial Court of Murcia, Spain, has agreed with Animal Equality’s appeal and ordered a new trial with a different judge. The court ruled that the evidence in the animal abuse case against the Carrasco brothers was not properly considered.
September
Animal Equality investigators filmed workers removing dead salmon from a fish farm just seven hours before Scottish Parliament members arrived for an industry inquiry–and shortly before industry representatives were set to give evidence in Parliament. This inquiry focuses on issues like sea lice, fish deaths, and environmental impact. The footage was reported by BBC One Scotland, The Guardian, The Times, and Daily Record.
September
Animal Equality and advocates from another animal protection group protested outside the Bundestag in Berlin, calling for stronger laws to protect animals in Germany. They criticized the current draft of the Animal Welfare Act for its long transition periods, vague language, and other concerning details.
JuLY
The State Congress of Colima, Mexico, unanimously approved an initiative to reform its Animal Protection Law. Supported by Animal Equality in Mexico, this initiative will impact nearly 9 million animals–including farmed animals.
JuLY
Animal Equality ran full-page ads in the Allen American–the hometown paper of Denny’s CEO Kelli Valade–and in the McKinney Courier-Gazette. The ads demanded an end to extreme confinement for mother pigs in Denny’s supply chain. The campaign also reached eight more local newspapers and online platforms, with digital ads running for a month.
JuLY
Dozens of athletes, academics, and environmentalists signed Animal Equality’s open letter urging the Olympic organizers to remove foie gras from the VIP hospitality menu. Soon after, Animal Equality’s UK Executive Director delivered over 60,000 petition signatures to the organizers in Paris. Local volunteers joined a protest outside the organizers’ office and projected messages on nearby buildings later that night.
JuLY
During an eight-month investigation of Cross Farm in Devon, England, Animal Equality and an award-winning photographer–Aitor Garmendia–gathered over 100 hours of footage. Animal Equality submitted a complaint to Trading Standards and the Animal and Plant Health Agency to hold the company accountable for its crimes.
June
Animal Equality organized a public hearing at the Legislative Assembly of the State of São Paulo. This hearing included a discussion about banning the killing of male chicks, as well as male calves in the dairy industry. During the hearing, Animal Equality released the report “Alternatives for the male chick culling: in ovo sexing technologies.”
June
Despite offering sustainable, plant-based dishes at the 2024 Paris Olympics, the Olympic Committee confirmed foie gras will be served to high-paying guests in luxury lounges. After The Independent exposed this controversy, Animal Equality launched a global campaign to remove foie gras from the menu.
June
For the first time in over a decade, Animal Equality released an investigation into Spain’s horse meat industry. At a slaughterhouse in Asturias, investigators found horses ineffectively stunned before slaughter and left to slowly bleed to death. Horses watched in fear as their companions were killed in front of them.
June
Animal Equality joined the Open Wing Alliance for a campaign against Kewpie, a Japanese mayonnaise company. While Kewpie has already released a commitment to reduce cages for hens in its US and European supply chains, Animal Equality has called on its leadership to extend this commitment globally.
June
Ahead of the UK General Election in July, the Labour Party committed to a foie gras import ban. This declaration followed a supporter email action led by Animal Equality.
June
An undercover investigator spent four months documenting conditions at one of Germany’s largest pig farms. The extensive footage shows serious violations of animal protection regulations–including illegal killing, deliberate mistreatment, and neglect.
May
At the Animal and Vegan Advocacy Summit in Washington, D.C., Animal Equality President Sharon Núñez, Vice President for Latin America Dulce Ramírez, and UK Executive Director Abigail Penny delivered speeches. President Sharon Núñez’s speech was featured on an animal advocacy podcast called How I Learned to Love Shrimp.
May
Animal Equality in the US has released its Restaurant Report, exposing thirteen restaurant chains failing to eliminate extreme confinement from their supply chains. Some have refused to commit publicly to phasing out cages for pregnant pigs, while others have abandoned their commitments entirely.
May
In the midst of Animal Equality’s campaign against Denny’s, Reuters reported that the chain is facing increasing pressure to phase out crates for pregnant pigs in its supply chain. The article, which was developed in collaboration with Animal Equality, noted that these so-called “gestation crates” would be a focal point of Denny’s upcoming shareholder vote.
May
Following Animal Equality’s protest at the second largest branch of Aldi Süd, a major German newspaper published an article about the opening of the XXL-ALDI and our protest. In it, the manager of the second largest store is quoted as saying, “In letters, they keep calling us […] murderers”. Animal Equality responded with a cease and desist letter.
May
The UK has made history by banning live animal exports, affecting millions of cows, sheep, and pigs each year. For over fifty years, Animal Equality has been supporting this campaign, which was led by Compassion in World Farming and Kent Action Against Live Exports.
May
Love Veg conducted plant-based cooking workshops at Las Colmenas Community Centers in Guadalajara, Mexico, serving 80 people in May.
APRIL
Animal Equality in Mexico joined a discussion at the Guerrero State Forum on Animal Protection and Welfare. This discussion was part of a forum called the “National Dialogues for the Debate of Constitutional Reforms,” which allows citizens to address lawmakers and secure legal protection for animals.
APRIL
With the launch of an Animal Equality campaign, hundreds of residents in Ann Arbor, Michigan, signed a petition urging their city council to enact a foie gras sales ban.
APRIL
In partnership with Animal Equality, Federal Deputy Luciene Cavalcante introduced two animal protection bills in the Brazilian National Congress. If passed, one bill would ban the killing of male chicks while the second would regulate the labeling of animal products.
MARCH
Mexico’s Chamber of Deputies unanimously approved an initiative by Animal Equality, Alianza Alimentaria, and Acción Climática to create the country’s first General Law on Adequate and Sustainable Nutrition. This law will promote plant-based food consumption while reducing the consumption of animal products.
MARCH
As a member of the Open Wing Alliance, Animal Equality in the U.S. joined a campaign against Hilton Worldwide and other hospitality groups. Advocates pointed out Hilton’s failure to report meaningful progress on its commitment to eliminate cages for hens and pigs in its supply chain.
MARCH
To protest extreme confinement for pigs in Aldi Süd’s US supply chain, Animal Equality placed a gestation crate inside a truck with transparent walls and drove it through major cities in Germany. This culminated in two protests in Mülheim an der Ruhr, home of Aldi Süd’s headquarters and the largest Aldi store in the world.
February
Animal Equality engaged in discussions with Mexico’s Political Coordination Board to encourage informed debate and reflection regarding the protection of farmed animals. Through this discussion, they called on the Senate directly to amend Article 73 of Mexico’s Constitution and establish the groundwork for Mexico’s first General Animal Welfare Law.
February
Animal Equality continued its campaign against extreme confinement in Denny’s supply chain through protests in Phoenix, Arizona; Irving, Texas; and Dallas, Texas.
February
In 2023, Animal Equality in Italy denounced the 27 European Union member countries where fast-growing chickens are bred to suffer against European law. The EU Commission intended to close our complaints, but Animal Equality objected. The Commission then revised its decision, keeping our complaints open to continue with the investigation.
JANUARY
Love Veg in the U.S. relaunched with a new pledge to join the Love Veg community. Subscribers receive a free e-cookbook and regular expert tips to begin their plant-based journey. Love Veg celebrated its fresh look with a billboard in the heart of Times Square in New York City.
JANUARY
Almost a year after launching a campaign against cruelty in Denny’s supply chain, Animal Equality launched a secondary campaign against Finn Partners, a public relations firm for which Denny’s is a client. Animal Equality is calling on Finn to cut ties with the diner chain and its association with animal cruelty. The campaign kicked off with a protest in New York City and Finn Partners’ flagship office. Animal Equality’s President and Executive Vice President joined the demonstration.
JANUARY
Animal Equality–in collaboration with Animal Partisan and a local Colorado attorney–filed a request for criminal charges against Colorado Lamb Processors and one of its supervisors, who was involved in an incident in which a lamb was improperly stunned three times prior to slaughter.
JANUARY
The trial of a farm filmed by journalist Jordi Évole and Animal Equality in Spain is set for sentencing. The trial comes after a 2018 investigation by Animal Equality in collaboration with the renowned Spanish television program Salvados, which exposed extreme animal abuse. The two owners of the farm face up to 14 counts of animal cruelty.
JANUARY
Animal Equality has initiated the promotion of an animal welfare initiative in Colima, Mexico. Once approved, it will become one of the first states to offer legal protections for farmed animals during breeding.
HELP US PROTECT ANIMALS ALL YEAR LONG
2023
DECEMBER
In honor of International Animal Rights Day, advocates with Animal Equality demonstrated in Guadalajara, Mexico; Madrid, Spain; São Paulo, Brazil; and Milan, Italy. Protesters displayed industry instruments, passed out flyers, and even displayed video footage from Animal Equality investigations. In Madrid’s central square, co-founder Javier Moreno gave a speech about farmed animal cruelty.
DECEMBER
Animal Equality in India released an investigation into 19 egg farms across India, where investigators found extreme cruelty and criminal violations. The findings included hens with severe injuries, piles of feces beneath their cramped cages, and hens suffering from slow, painful deaths without care.
DECEMBER
Animal Equality traveled to Denny’s headquarters in Spartanburg, South Carolina, to deliver a letter representing more than 53,000 messages from concerned citizens gone ignored by the corporation. They were turned away by a Denny’s representative, and the police were called as they exited peacefully. Spartanburg’s local FOX News channel provided coverage of the event.
DECEMBER
Writing personally to Animal Equality’s supporters, celebrity Chris Packham drew attention to ‘zombie salmon’ who suffer from deformities, disease, and deadly lice attacks, urging the Scottish Government to halt the industry’s growth. His letter inspired politician Monica Lennon to question Salmon Scotland about these issues in the Scottish Parliament.
November
During a protest against extreme confinement in Denny’s supply chain, the son of a Denny’s executive was photographed issuing an obscene gesture to activists. This is the first response Animal Equality received from Denny’s, despite tens of thousands of emails, phone calls, and other actions taken by concerned consumers.
November
Animal Equality relaunched a global campaign against the force-feeding of ducks and geese for foie gras. With the relaunch, Animal Equality released never-before-seen images of force-feeding on duck farms in France.
November
Animal Equality in Mexico launched a campaign with never-before-seen images of dairy production to promote the consumption of plant-based milks, helping to reduce the suffering of cows and calves.
November
Animal Equality began promoting an animal welfare initiative in two Mexican states: Nuevo León and Aguascalientes. Once approved, they will be among the first states to provide legal protections for farmed animals during breeding.
October
During the launch of a global campaign against ALDI, Animal Equality protesters met in front of the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin with three gestation crates on display. They called out ALDI’s double standards for animal welfare, as the company has eliminated gestation crates in its German supply chain while allowing them in its U.S. supply chain.
October
Elior North America committed to eliminating cages for mother pigs and hens in its supply chain––estimated to impact 640 pigs and 117,960 hens annually. It became the last of America’s five largest food-service companies to announce a group housing policy for pregnant pigs.
October
Love Veg in Mexico visited universities to teach students how to cook plant-based recipes and raise awareness about the impact of dietary choices. This plant-based tour used the slogan ‘More Legumes to Save Animals.’
October
Animal Equality shows never-before-seen evidence of the cruelty of gestation crates and the mutilation of piglets on farms in Spain. Despite public support in Spain for a ban on gestation crates and regulations governing mutilations, these practices are still standard.
October
The influential expert-led Animal Welfare Committee accepted a number of key suggestions proposed by Animal Equality UK for farmed fish legislation at the time of killing. These measures include making CCTV mandatory in fish slaughterhouses, increased inspections, heightened transparency and greater law enforcement.
October
In a front-page story in The Times, Animal Equality revealed that 86% of Brits surveyed (excluding the ‘don’t know’ responses) are in favor of a ban on the importation of foie gras produced by force-feeding.
SEPTEMBER
Animal Equality released an investigation inside five pig farms in Spain, capturing evidence of painful injuries and death from the unsanitary conditions. Live animals were found nibbling on the bodies of dead pigs, while dead rats and maggots were found around the farm.
SEPTEMBER
The Senate of the Republic approved Mexico’s Adequate and Sustainable Food Law. If approved in the Chamber of Deputies, it would be a fundamental step toward a future where food is sustainable, healthy, and compassionate toward animals.
SEPTEMBER
Using footage obtained by Animal Equality in the UK, BBC Countryfile ran a televised segment about rising on-farm death rates in the Scottish salmon industry. The program prompted hundreds to turn to Twitter and vow to boycott fish products as a result.
SEPTEMBER
Carrying banners, signs, and leaflets, activists joined Animal Equality in Brazil to protest against the Delta supermarket chain in Piracicaba, São Paulo. The protest is part of Animal Equality’s campaign against Delta to establish protections for hens.
SEPTEMBER
Along with dozens of other animal protection groups, Animal Equality in the U.S. signed a letter urging the House of Representative and Senate to reject the EATS Act. If passed, the EATS Act could overturn animal protection legislation around the nation, including California’s Prop. 12.
SEPTEMBER
Around a dozen protesters gathered for the Philadelphia premiere of a documentary produced by Denny’s largest franchise owner. Together, animal defenders asked Dawn Lafreeda to use her influence and urge Denny’s to remove gestation crates from its supply chain.
SEPTEMBER
Jollibee Food Corp., one of the fastest-growing global restaurant chains, announced its commitment to no longer buy eggs from caged hens. This follows a campaign launched by the Open Wing Alliance, of which Animal Equality is a key member.
SEPTEMBER
During a personal meeting with the Federal Government Commissioner for Animal Welfare, Animal Equality in Germany handed over more than 58,000 signatures calling for an end to the forced fattening of ducks and geese in the European foie gras industry.
AUGust
Animal Equality in Brazil met with Members of the European Parliament to discuss the detrimental impact the EU-Mercosur Agreement will have on animals and the environment.
AUGust
Animal Equality campaigned against the extreme confinement of mother pigs in Denny’s supply chain with a digital billboard in Times Square, New York City. It featured a video of a pig begging to be freed from its tiny, metal cage with text that read, “Animal abuse is bad for business.”
AUGust
Animal Equality in Mexico launched the campaign “Choose Without Cages” to help reduce hens’ suffering by promoting plant-based egg alternatives.
JULY
Animal Equality’s President, Vice President for Latin America, and Executive Director for the UK attended the Animal and Vegan Advocacy (AVA) Summit in Los Angeles. Each gave powerful speeches about Animal Equality’s work to protect farmed animals.
JULY
After years of campaigning by Animal Equality and other coalition members, New Jersey joined eleven U.S. states in banning the confinement of pigs used for breeding and calves raised for veal.
JULY
In Mexico, official data about chicken and hen mortality only includes the number killed in slaughterhouses. It does not include those who die before the time of slaughter, often due to poor welfare. Animal Equality published a report which finally accounted for these early deaths.
JUNE
Renowned philosopher Peter Singer visited Madrid to present the Spanish edition of his book, “Ethics in Action,” with Animal Equality’s President and Co-founder, Sharon Núñez.
JUNE
Animal Equality in the U.S. released a new undercover investigation into India’s dairy industry, featuring celebrated actress and activist Richa Moorjani.
JUNE
Animal Equality released an investigation into four egg farms and a hen slaughterhouse in São Paulo, Brazil, showing extreme confinement and suffering.
JUNE
Animal Equality in Mexico promoted an initiative to amend the Animal Welfare Law in the State of Puebla. The bill would improve animal protection on farms and require the installation of video surveillance in slaughterhouses.
MAY
Animal Equality held a 24-hour protest outside a Las Vegas Denny’s as part of its campaign to hold the restaurant chain accountable for its decade-old commitment to end cages for mother pigs.
MAY
In a historic decision, the United States Supreme Court upheld California’s Proposition 12, which establishes protections for hens, pigs, and calves typically confined to tiny cages. Animal Equality was part of a coalition that worked to uphold this important law.
MAY
With a coalition, Animal Equality in Brazil has requested an animal welfare clause be added to the controversial Mercosur-European Union Treaty. This agreement raises concerns over an increase in the number of Brazilian animals raised and killed for their meat.
MAY
Animal Equality in Mexico launched a campaign to criminalize animal cruelty in the state of Chiapas, where animal abuse is not yet considered a crime. If approved, Animal Equality’s initiative will protect more than 100 million animals.
APRIL
Animal Equality in Brazil spoke at a public hearing to debate the impact of The European Union-Mercosur Agreement, an agreement that would negatively impact farmed animals by increasing their rate of production.
APRIL
Following pressure from Animal Equality in the U.S., leading packaged goods company Conagra has committed to eliminating crates for pigs in its supply chain. Conagra is the supplier of iconic food products like Slim Jim and Chef Boyardee.
MARCH
Animal Equality’s work to change the Mexican Constitution continues following approval by the Chamber of Deputies. If approved by the Senate, the change would give the Mexican Congress power to legislate on animal matters.
MARCH
Animal Equality released never-before-seen images captured during a chicken slaughterhouse investigation in Mexico. Images showed workers violently grabbing chickens by their legs and chickens killed while fully conscious.
MARCH
Concerned residents in Vancouver, Washington joined Animal Equality in the U.S. to share their support for a city-wide ban on the sale of foie gras at City Hall.
MARCH
In an effort to combat further deregulation of Brazil’s meat industry, Animal Equality exposed what happens inside illegal slaughterhouses. Investigators found extreme animal abuse and sanitary violations that pose a public health risk.
MARCH
Animal Equality and fellow activists protest outside of Spain’s Ministry of Agriculture to demand an end to cages.
MARCH
Animal Equality and other worldwide members of the Open Wing Alliance protested in front of Mercadona supermarkets in Madrid, Spain to demand the company fulfill its cage-free commitment.
FEBRUARY
Animal Equality and Animal Partisan filed a letter addressing Walworth County, Wisconsin’s District Attorney, asking for animal cruelty charges against an Elkhorn meat processor and its General Manager. The groups are urging District Attorney Zeke Wiedenfeld to pursue criminal charges against Wilson Farm Meats and the company’s General Manager, Justin Corman, for abusing a steer while forcing him into restraints for slaughter.
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FEBRUARY
The EU Commission has responded to a complaint by Animal Equality, acknowledging that the breeding of “fast-growing” chickens is problematic. This response follows allegations by Animal Equality that the European Commission’s 27 member states violated the law by breeding these animals though it causes suffering. The Commission has indicated that it is considering options for action to address the negative consequences of raising these animals as part of its review of legislation on the welfare of farmed animals, due by 2023.
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FEBRUARY
Animal Equality holds a successful protest outside a Denny’s restaurant in Austin, Texas, to call out the company’s failed commitment to end cages for mother pigs. Dozens of activists joined in support, including advocates in other states who stood outside their local Denny’s restaurants. The protest is a continuation of Animal Equality’s efforts to hold Denny’s accountable for its decade-old commitment to end the extreme confinement of pregnant pigs in its supply chain.
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FEBRUARY
Animal Equality, along with fellow animal advocacy group Animal Partisan, filed a criminal complaint against major turkey producer Plainville Farms for animal cruelty. The complaint stems from a 2021 PETA undercover investigation which recorded Plainville “catch crews” routinely kicking, stomping, throwing, beating, and choking turkeys being loaded onto trucks for slaughter.
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FEBRUARY
Animal Equality UK partnered with OneKind to coordinate an open letter, signed by cross-party Members of Parliament (MPs) and Members of Scottish Parliament (MSPs), calling for the expansion of the destructive Scottish salmon industry to be halted. This comes shortly after an Animal Equality UK investigation revealed that between January and November 2022, nearly 15 million salmon died early on fish farms in the UK – a record number of on-farm deaths for this industry.
FEBRUARY
The Congress of Mexico City passed legislation promoted by Animal Equality to outlaw clandestine slaughterhouses. Operators of these facilities will now be subject to two to four years in prison and a fine. The proposed legislation passed with 51 votes in favor, 2 dissents, and no abstentions.
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JANUARY
In the state of Veracruz in Mexico, Animal Equality and fellow animal protection organizations promoted an animal welfare initiative to improve the standards for animals on farms and in slaughterhouses. In Veracruz, nearly 250 million animals are raised and slaughtered for food without any type of protection.The initiative seeks to provide basic protections to protect the health and well-being of these animals and outlaw animal cruelty. The initiative was presented by congresswoman Tania María Cruz Mejía, and supported by more than 30 deputies.
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JANUARY
Animal Equality in the US launched a strong campaign against the popular restaurant chain, Denny’s, to hold the company accountable for a decade-old commitment to eliminate crates for pregnant pigs. Denny’s promised the end the use of these cages 10 years ago but failed to follow through. Animal Equality has called on supporters to write executives of the company and take action to demand Denny’s end the confinement of pigs in cages .
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JANUARY
Animal Equality, along with 18 animal protection organizations in Europe, joined at the EU Parliament to call for a ban to the slaughter of male chicks in the egg industry. The event was supported by Members of the European Parliament, as well as experts in animal welfare and technological alternatives to chick slaughter. Every year, 300 million are crushed, gassed or ground up in Europe because they cannot lay eggs and are not one of the fast-growing breeds used for meat.
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JANUARY
Animal Equality attended an informational hearing at the Oregon Senate to co-present legislation to protect farmed fish. The initiative would create minimum welfare standards for fish as the state plans to see an expansion of aquaculture—”factory farming in water.”
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2022
DECEMBER
Delaware North has strengthened its animal standards policy following a campaign by Animal Equality. This is the fourth-largest food service and hospitality group in the world. The company has committed to group housing for mother pigs by 2025, with the eventual elimination of gestation crates from its supply chain. This step forward will spare thousands of pregnant pigs from extreme confinement in cages where they can’t even turn around.
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DECEMBER
Joined by a dozen animal activists, Animal Equality held a protest on the front lawn of the US Captiol to denounce the global horse meat trade. This is a part of ongoing efforts to end this practice–including a permanent ban on horse slaughter in- and outside of US borders.
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DECEMBER
Animal Equality exposes evidence of the conditions of pigs, cows and chickens as they are transported to slaughterhouses and factory farms in Mexico. The images show operators kicking, beating, and walking on animals. Animals are forced to travel in their own waste and in extreme weather conditions. During unloading, animals often slip and fall off the vehicles as workers push them.
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DECEMBER
For the past six months, Animal Equality has been working tirelessly to stop the ‘Self-Control’ bill that will allow slaughterhouses to regulate themselves. Animal Equality participated in a Senate debate opposing the harmful bill. Despite great pressure from society against this bill, the farmers and slaughterhouses have great power to influence Brazilian politicians. At the end of the year the bill was approved. Animal Equallity is working together with 38 other organizations to evaluate how to suspend the effects of this new law.
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DECEMBER
Alongside other activists, Animal Equality held a protest in the center of Madrid for International Animal Rights Day. The activists called on the Government to stop ignoring cruelty towards animals on factory farms and in slaughterhouses by passing legislation to end their suffering.
DECEMBER
Animal Equality captures footage inside a large pig farm in Lombardy, Italy. This is part of a series of investigations since 2019 that reveals the suffering of animals on a farm that supplies products labeled “made-in-Italy excellence.” Footage shows pigs with sores, cysts and wounds, and dying pigs left laying on the floor in their feces and uring without care. The bodies of some dead piglets were torn apart with heads, legs and other body parts scattered around the farm. Investigators also found buckets of rotting animal remains. Animal Equality is calling for prompt action by the authorities to press charges against the farm.
NOVEMBER
Animal Equality releases new footage of American horses at the Cárnicas de Jerez slaughterhouse in Zacatecas, Mexico. Among them, a horse identified as 5036 by his yellow USDA label was killed for his meat the day after investigators filmed him. The second part of this investigation documented the killing of horses inside Mexican slaughterhouses. Filmed in a slaughterhouse in Arriaga, Chiapas, the footage shows workers giving electric shocks to horses and hanging themby the neck, suffocating them till death while they are fully conscious.
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NOVEMBER
After just a few months of intensive campaigning, the world’s largest food services company, Compass Group, officially commits to ending crates for mother pigs by summer 2023. The company will also improve the treatment of chickens, eliminate the confinement of hens in cages, and provide regular updates on this progress.
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NOVEMBER
Animal Equality co-authors a new bill that requires food companies to inform in their labels whether animals were harmed physically or emotionally during production. Practices such as extreme confinement and the killing of male chicks in the egg industry would have to be disclosed. The goal of the bill, written with the supoprt of other organizations and introduced by São Paulo state deputy Carlos Giannazi (PSOL), is to incetivize companies to move away from these cruel practices.
NOVEMBER
In a first-of-its-kind report, Animal Equality UK and The Animal Law Foundation researched the enforcement of animal welfare laws in the UK. Findings show fewer than 3% of UK farms are inspected each year, and less than 1% of animal welfare complaints against farms and slaughterhouses lead to a prosecution. The report was presented at a Parliamentary reception, bringing together influential MPs, celebrities and experts to tackle the problem affecting millions of animals.
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NOVEMBER
Animal Equality held a protest at the Ministry of Agriculture in Spain against the force-feeding of ducks and greese. The activists demanded the Government’s commitment to end this cruelty. The campaign has already collected more than 82,000 signatures.
OCTOBER
Animal Equality has investigated the slaughter of horses for their meat in Mexico, Spain and Italy. These investigations showed the unnecessary suffering of these animals who are often killed while conscious. Over 4.3 million horses are consumed by humans around the world every year. Now we are demanding a ban on the transport and slaughter of these sensitive animals.
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OCTOBER
Animal Equality has continued its efforts against Compass Group, the world’s largest food service provider, with a protest in Austin, Texas. Around a dozen supporters gathered outside of Bank of America–a client of Compass–to call on the company to use its influence and hold Compass accountable. Ten years ago, Compass Group promised to end the use of cages for mother pigs during their pregnancy but later abandoned that promise. Animal Equality launched a campaign against the company in July to demand it keeps its commitment to pigs and its consumers.
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OCTOBER
In January 2022, the German Government banned the killing of male chicks in hatcheries. Although it is a good step towards preventing the suffering and killing of these animals, some companies now raise those male chicks during weeks and then kill them for meat production. Animal Equality in Germany demands the amendment of the existing law to prevent this from happening and spare millions of chickens.
OCTOBER
Together with more than twenty European animal protection organizations, Animal Equality is campaigning against LIDL. We are calling on the grocery store chain to eliminate overbreeding and the lack of daylight, space for chickens in their supply chain.
SEPTEMBER
Animal Equality met at São Paulo’s State Assembly alongside several animal, environmental, and human health protection organizations. The public hearing was organized by Animal Equality with the support of State Representative Carlos Giannazi. The organizations met in opposition of Brazil’s ‘Self-Control’ Bill to discuss their concerns of the harmful initiative.
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SEPTEMBER
RIU Hotels & Resorts has made a public commitment to ensure that 100% of the eggs consumed in all its hotels and in all its products come from cage-free hens by the end of 2025. As one of the most important hotel chains in the world–with hotels in the Americas, Europe, Africa and Asia–this commitment will improve the lives of more than 375,000 hens each year.
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SEPTEMBER
The Spanish Government now requires slaughterhouses to install video surveillance cameras. More than 700 such facilities across Spain will have to install video CCTV cameras. The Decree gives the operators themselves the authority to monitor their own actions. Animal Equality values positively the approval of this decree but considers it to be insufficient until independent parties have access to review the footage.
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SEPTEMBER
TORIDOLL Holdings Corporation, one of the world’s largest restaurant companies based in Japan, has released a policy pledging to source 100 percent cage-free eggs and egg products for its restaurant locations worldwide. This is the largest cage-free commitment from a Japanese-multinational corporation to date. The commitment follows collaboration between Toridoll and the Open Wing Alliance, a global coalition of more than 90 major animal protection organizations across 63 countries, including Animal Equality.
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AUGUST
In a historic achievement for animals promoted by Animal Equality, Italy has passed a law banning the killing of day-old male chicks in the egg industry. The industry must implement measures by 2026 to comply with the law. The new law will impact the lives of 25-40 million animals annually.
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JULY
Animal Equality’s investigation into a fast-growing chicken farm in Italy revealed chickens living in manure and urine-soaked litter, dead and decaying animals left among the living, and chickens suffering from injuries due to their weight and size. The two filthy sheds we investigated house nearly one million chickens every year.
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JULY
Animal Equality in India released an undercover investigation outside a dairy farm in Paglahat Village near Kolkata. The investigation revealed workers abusing a female buffalo as they attempted to load her onto a transport truck. The images captured showed them beating and twisting her tail to cause pain, violently and repeatedly pushing a stick into her genitals, causing bleeding wounds, and pouring water over her nose and mouth to make her feel like she was drowning. Animal Equality submitted evidence of this incident to the Animal Welfare Board of India, which filed a complaint with the Kolkata Police. Animal Equality has denounced these crimes and calls for the workers to be prosecuted.
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JULY
Animal Equality released the most extensive investigation completed by an organization documenting the emotional and physical suffering of cows, pigs, and sheep in more than 30 slaughterhouses in 13 states of Mexico. Images show how cows and pigs experience pain and fear at the time of slaughter because they are still conscious due to ineffective stunning methods.
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JULY
Pokeworks, a brand of the Asian restaurant giant Toridoll, is taking a global stand against cages, thanks to the actions of volunteers from Animal Equality and more than 80 member organizations of the Open Wing Alliance. As a result, the restaurant will reject caged eggs by 2023 at more than 65 locations in countries, including the United States and Mexico.
JULY
Animal Equality in Mexico introduced an initiative to recognize the sentience of animals in the Political Constitution of Nuevo León, Mexico. This recognition will be essential for protecting all species in Nuevo León, where more than 42 million animals are killed for their meat.
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JULY
After negotiations with Animal Equality, Mantiqueira—South America’s largest egg farm —was the first Latin American company to commit not to buy female chicks from hatcheries that practice chick killing. This is an important step for hatcheries interested in using new technology that can determine the sex of the chick before it hatches.
JULY
Animal Equality is prosecuting the owners from “the farm of horrors” in Spain, where we recorded with the television program Salvados, pigs suffering from large hernias, deformation, dead pigs, and cannibalism. We’re imposing a 3-year prison sentence and 9 years of being prohibited from working in any animal-related profession for each defendant.
JULY
Animal Equality launched a campaign against Compass Group for not delivering on their promise to ban cages for mother pigs ten years ago. Currently, 90% of the pigs it sources and sells come from mother pigs that have spent a third of their lives locked in a cage.
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JULY
Animal Equality presented at the first UK Parliamentary meeting ever to take place focusing on fish welfare at the time of killing. Coordinated by the UK All-Party Parliamentary Group on Animal Welfare, and hosted by former President of the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons, MP Lord Trees, the meeting discussed the need for increased legal protections for farmed fish.
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JUNE
Animal Equality released an investigation inside three Brazilian slaughterhouses following the Senate’s initial approval for a bill reducing government oversight and giving companies the power to conduct their own inspections. Our investigation revealed employees kicking animals, killing them while still conscious, dragging them with ropes, and twisting their tails to inflict pain. We’ve requested Senators to postpone the voting and hold a new public hearing so that the voices of animal advocates can be heard.
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JUNE
Animal Equality released an investigation into lamb transportation during the Easter holiday this April from Eastern Europe to Italian slaughterhouses. The images we captured showed lambs traveling by the hundreds in trucks with insufficient space causing the inability to stand, a non-functioning watering system with leaks, a damaged temperature monitoring system, and a lack of dividers between animals with horns. We’re calling on policymakers to do more to protect them and end this cruel trade.
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JUNE
Animal Equality in Germany – together with their supporters – is calling on companies and legislators to change their policies and implement laws to protect animals and end factory farming.
JUNE
The Congress of the State of Hidalgo unanimously approved the initiative promoted by Animal Equality to reform the Law for the Protection and Dignified Treatment of Animals and the Criminal Code of Hidalgo. Acts of cruelty to animals, including farmed animals, are now considered crimes punished with prison sentences of up to 4 years. Nearly 50 million cows, pigs, hens, chickens, and other animals raised on factory farms and killed in slaughterhouses in Hidalgo will now be more protected from abuse. Hidalgo is now the first state in Mexico to protect farmed animals in law.
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JUNE
Animal Equality filed a lawsuit in California Superior Court in Stanislaus County against Foster Farms, a West Coast poultry company that specializes in chicken and turkey products. The suit follows Animal Equality’s findings after an undercover investigation revealed baby chicks being crushed, drowned and mutilated at a Foster Farms’ hatchery, Ellenwood Hatchery, located in Waterford, CA.
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MAY
The EU for Animals campaign, calling for an EU Animal Welfare Commissioner, was promoted by Animal Equality and over 40 animal protection organizations. The campaign has received more than 169,000 public signatures and has been signed by 127 members of the European Parliament of all political groups. If the initiative is passed, the Commissioner’s responsibility would become “Health, Food Safety, and Animal Welfare.”
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APRIL
Animal Equality introduced a bill in Mexico to recognize all animals with a complex nervous system as sentient beings with welfare protections under the law. If the bill is approved, the initiative will amend article four of the Political Constitution of the United Mexican States and ensure animal protection.
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MARCH
Animal Equality investigators in Italy infiltrated a chicken factory farm to collect the bodies of seven birds who had died there. Specialized veterinarians who analyzed them, found that fast-growing chicks reach up to six pounds in just seven weeks and suffer from numerous health conditions like pneumonia, heart attacks, and respiratory diseases. Because of their enormous size, the chicks are unable to walk or stand up and are susceptible to bone injuries. Animal Equality is demanding that the Italian Government, the Minister of Health, and the Minister for Agricultural Policies prohibit breeding animals genetically selected to grow so large and so fast that they spend their entire lives suffering.
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MARCH
Animal Equality released an investigation into a pig farm in Jalisco, Mexico where our investigators uncovered the painful mutilations that pigs endure shortly after birth. The images we uncovered show piglets being castrated or having their tails cut without anesthesia. The investigation was covered by some of the most important media in the country and helped educate millions of people on the implications of meat consumption and encourage them to reduce or eliminate meat from their plates.
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FEBRUARY
An Animal Equality undercover investigation inside Madox Farm, a dairy farm in Carmarthenshire, South Wales revealed workers kicking and punching cows in the face and stomach, twisting their tails, and hitting them with sharp metal shovels. In one instance, a pregnant cow was left to suffer and die after her baby died inside of her despite a veterinarian’s recommendation for prompt euthanasia. The footage aired on BBC One’s Panorama, one of the country’s biggest television programs, and was seen by millions of viewers. Animal Equality is calling for the farm to be prosecuted and held accountable for its crimes.
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FEBRUARY
Animal Equality launched a US campaign calling for a complete ban on the sale and production of foie gras. Foie gras, one of the cruelest foods on the market, is made by force-feeding ducks and geese to induce fatty liver disease. Forced-feeding can cause difficulty standing and walking, damage to the birds esophagus, difficulty breathing, and heart or kidney failure. Our work with state and local legislation is ongoing as we advance toward a permanent ban in the United States.
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2021
DECEMBER
A new undercover investigation by Animal Equality reveals shocking violations of animal cruelty laws in a major U.S. hatchery. Hours old chicks are routinely crushed and mutilated by high-speed automated processing machinery and left to suffer and die of their injuries. Chicks often drown, are scalded to death and left to languish on the facility floor or in discarded waste before they are sent to be ground up alive.
Animal Equality is seeking justice for these crimes by demanding that charges be filed against Foster Farms for their serious violations of California’s animal cruelty laws.
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DECEMBER
The Italian Parliament voted and approved the amendment that introduces a ban on the selective culling of male chicks by December 2026.
Animal Equality launched a campaign in 2020 against male chick culling in the egg industry, which has been signed by more than 110,000 people asking the government and industry to put an end to this terrible practice. Thanks to this work and the support by Italian officials, this ban will spare 25-40 million male chicks each year in Italy.
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DECEMBER
Animal Equality infiltrated tilapia farms in Mexico for the first time and uncovered the suffering these animals face at the hands of aquaculture due to the lack of laws protecting them from cruelty. In addition to the deplorable hygienic and sanitary conditions in which the fish are forced to live in the farms investigated, it is common practice in the industry for them to be killed without being stunned. Animal Equality is working to educate consumers and increase protections for fish.
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OCTOBER
Animal Equality has uncovered acts of cruelty committed against pigs at the 22nd slaughterhouse investigated in Mexico, this time at the Rastro Municipal Regional in Tizayuca, Hidalgo.
With the footage compiled by our investigators, we filed three complaints with the proper authorities: the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development of the Government of Mexico, the State Attorney’s Office for Environmental Protection of the Government of Hidalgo, and the Ministry of Health of the Government of Hidalgo, demanding that the acts of cruelty be sanctioned and eradicated.
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OCTOBER
In Spain in 2020, 906 million land animals were slaughtered, including cows, pigs, chickens, lambs, goats, rabbits and horses. Investigations carried out by Animal Equality over the last fifteen years have documented how many of them are killed while fully conscious, causing them completely avoidable suffering.
Animal Equality urges that 7 legal modifications be made to prevent these events from occurring, including exceptions to legal obligations, gaps in legislation and bad practices in the country’s slaughterhouses which result in excess suffering.
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SEPTEMBER
Animal Equality joined the Open Wing Alliance, a coalition of over 75 organizations, to launch a global cage-free campaign for Yum! Brands, parent company of KFC, Taco Bell, Pizza Hut, and The Habit Burger Grill. Animal Equality led protests in Italy and Spain and did digital actions around the globe. After 4 months of campaigning, Yum! Brands released its global cage-free policy that will cover at least 26,000 locations by 2026 and all locations by 2030. This is the largest cage-free policy that has ever been published and the policy will have major impacts in Asia where the cage-free work is still very new. We estimate this policy will impact up to 25 million hens!
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SEPTEMBER
Animal Equality launches an international campaign that exposes the ever-expanding and unregulated meat industry in Brazil as the main cause of the country’s extensive environmental destruction and some of the worst abuses against its animals. This devastation and suffering is a direct result of the illegal fires and deforestation in the Pantanal wetlands and Cerrado savannas.
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AUGUST
Subway announces the commitment to improve chicken welfare in its European supply chain by publicly committing to the European Chicken Commitment (ECC). This was not an easy feat, it took 22 non-profit organizations from 16 European countries and 1.5 years of campaigning to push the company to this end. Animal Equality played a major role in this campaign along with other coalition members of the Open Wing Alliance. We sent campaigners to Amsterdam to protest and attempted to meet with Subway’s leadership, held protests in Italy, Spain, and the UK, and activated our social media networks where thousands of animal advocates from all around the world took part in highly impactful digital actions.
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AUGUST
Animal Equality investigates Simmons Farm Raised Catfish slaughterhouse, located in Yazoo City, Mississippi. Simmons is one of the largest USDA inspected catfish slaughterhouses in the U.S., supplying grocery stores Kroger, Save a Lot, and Piggly Wiggly, as well as restaurant chains Cracker Barrel and Captain D’s. Our investigative team found numerous instances of animal abuse and suffering—incidents that are in violation of existing state animal cruelty laws. We’re now demanding that Kroger Kroger drop Simmons Farm Raised Catfish.
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JULY
In a rare behind-the-scenes look at a common egg industry practice, Animal Equality releases an investigation into the forced fasting of hens to increase their egg production, a cruel practice called “forced molting.” The investigation took place in Mexico’s top egg-producing state, Jalisco. In concert with this investigation, we presented an initiative in the Congress of Jalisco that calls for a ban on forced molting, which deprives hens of water and food for 7-14 days, during which the hens will lose their feathers and stop laying eggs in order to accelerate a new cycle of egg production.
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JULY
In a historic move for animal protection, Puebla, Mexico voted to pass a law that will criminalize unregulated slaughterhouses (also known as “backyard” or “underground” slaughterhouses) and slaughter at live animal markets. The new law, which was passed after Animal Equality in Mexico participated in talks with various agencies of the Government of Puebla, will also make it illegal for land animals in the state to be slaughtered without prior stunning.
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JULY
Animal Equality releases an investigation documenting suffering and abuse on a pig farm in Lombardy, Italy, affiliated with the Bompieri Group, whose products are known through a marketing slogan to be the “Excellence of Made in Italy.” The investigation—carried out in collaboration with local Italian television—reveals poor and unsanitary living conditions, as well as sewage spills that could put the surrounding environment at risk.
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JUNE
After years of campaigning by animal protection groups, including Animal Equality, the European Commission agrees to “put forward a legislative proposal by the end of 2023 to phase out and finally prohibit the use of cages for all the animal species and categories referred to in the [End the Cage Age] initiative.” This legislation will include commonly caged animals chickens, rabbits, and ducks, as well as female pigs confined in farrowing and gestation crates, calves used by the dairy industry, and other farmed animals.
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JUNE
Animal Equality’s campaign to ban live animal markets wins Eurogroup’s #Campaign4Animals 2020 Award. The award was created and promoted by Eurogroup for Animals—a pan-European animal advocacy organization, comprising 77 member organizations, whose key focus is to improve the wellbeing of as many animals as possible through effective legal advocacy and public awareness work. The campaign was highlighted for its tremendous impact on animals, as well as how it responded to the COVID-19 crisis and mobilized supporters.
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JUNE
Animal Equality presents over half a million signatures to the United Nations (U.N.) along with a petition that called for the end of the sale of live animals at the world’s wet markets. In addition, letters were delivered calling on the governing body to publicly acknowledge the risks live animal sales pose to global health and urging policymakers all over the world to restrict wet markets from selling live animals.
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JUNE
Animal Equality releases an investigation documenting what happens to pigs inside an Italian slaughterhouse, revealing the terrible cruelty that animals endure within these places. The investigation was filmed at Zema Srl slaughterhouse located in the province of Cremona—a facility known for its “quality” products, as well as being a representative company of “Made in Italy” marketing, both in Italy and abroad.
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JUNE
Thanks to the work of Animal Equality, as well as other animal protection groups, Nevada announces it will become the 9th state in the U.S. to ban cages for hens, joining Utah, Colorado, Michigan, Washington, Oregon, California, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island. The bill not only bans the caging of hens in Nevada but also requires eggs sold in the state to be from cage-free facilities, no matter where the eggs were produced.
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MAY
In Brazil, Animal Equality releases an investigation into the country’s meat industry and its practice of slaughtering pregnant cows. An accompanying public petition asks Brazil’s Ministry of Agriculture to forbid the killings of these pregnant animals. About half of the cows slaughtered in Brazil are females, and when they are pregnant, it presents intense suffering for both the cows and their calves.
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APRIL
Animal Equality UK releases a disturbing investigation showing animal suffering filmed at P&G Sleigh Pig Unit in Aberdeenshire, Scotland. The footage shows very troubling scenes as well as a number of serious legal violations, with one expert describing the incidents as “some of the most disturbing” he’s ever seen. The farm, which is owned by senior pig industry figure, Philip Sleigh, is labeled in the U.K. as “quality assured.”
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APRIL
A new report produced by Animal Equality Mexico details the alarming impact animal farming has on the environment. The report follows the 2020 release of the short documentary, Enemy of the Planet, and shows the visible ecological damage due to animal agriculture in Jalisco. Faced with this overwhelming evidence, Animal Equality filed 44 complaints with local authorities and called for the facilities to be shut down.
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MARCH
Animal Equality launches a national campaign in the U.S to ban the egg industry’s routine killing of baby chicks. Chick culling is a practice used by egg producers in which male chicks are killed the day they are born because they are not considered profitable by the industry. In the U.S. alone, around 300 million male chicks are killed each year. This means over 34,000 freshly hatched chicks die every hour. In just a few days, the petition calling for national ban nets thousands of signatures.
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MARCH
In response to thousands of cows and calves being stranded on the Mediterranean Sea for many months, Animal Equality Spain holds numerous demonstrations to protest the cruelty of live animal transport, which causes animals immense pain and suffering. Usually done without food or water, animals are shuttled across long distances by truck and boat, with many perishing along the way. Animals who die at sea usually end up being tossed into the water, with some even falling in while still alive.
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FEBRUARY
In India, Animal Equality exposes the abuses and crimes of the country’s fishery and aquaculture sector and shows the inefficient use of precious resources, like water and land. The investigation included footage from several fish and shrimp farms, hatcheries, and fish markets, shot over a year’s time in multiple Indian states.
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FEBRUARY
Animal Equality brought to light distressing scenes from a farm in Catalonia, Spain, where the highest concentration of intensive pig farms are located. The investigation’s footage shows the farm’s non-compliance with Spanish regulations for the protection of pigs in the country, with evidence found of sanitation irregularities, animal abuse, and possible environmental crimes.
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FEBRUARY
In collaboration with Italian television, Animal Equality releases a new investigation that reveals the cruel reality for pigs bred for meat in Northern Italy—a region that markets its products with the stamp of the “excellence of Made in Italy.” The area also affected by pollution and sewage spills related to the massive presence of intensive farming.
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FEBRUARY
Animal Equality releases undercover footage from a slaughter facility operated by The Scottish Salmon Company, a supplier of major UK supermarkets, as well as numerous international retailers, including in the US. The pioneering footage, shot by an undercover investigator, is the first of its kind to be released in the UK and shows the brutal nature in which farmed salmon are killed.
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JANUARY
Animal Equality and Champion Petfoods resolve certain legal claims, filed by Animal Equality in 2020 in D.C. Superior Court, related to the pet food company’s marketing of the rainbow trout in its products. The company corrected ‘wild-caught’ marketing claims on its website and agreed to provide additional transparency regarding its fish sourcing practices.
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2020
DECEMBER
Animal Equality publishes harrowing footage of chickens suffering on a German farm used by the country’s largest chicken producer, Wiesenhof. The material was leaked to Animal Equality and in turn, we filed a complaint against the farm with relevant German authorities.
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DECEMBER
In honor of International Animal Rights Day, Animal Equality releases a new investigation that reveals that wet markets in China continue to sell and slaughter dogs and cats for meat, despite media reports and statements from the country’s government proclaiming otherwise. According to research, more than 10 million dogs and 4 million cats are killed for consumption each year in the country.
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DECEMBER
Following a campaign by Animal Equality Italy, Assoavi, the trade association that represents major egg producers in the country, commits to working to eliminate the routine mass culling of male chicks in the egg industry.
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DECEMBER
Animal Equality India releases a new investigation into the country’s chicken production industry, detailing numerous animal welfare and food safety violations. This is our second investigation into India’s chicken farms, and recommendations to reduce the suffering of chickens have been presented to the Indian government.
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NOVEMBER
Animal Equality, along with five other nonprofits, files a formal complaint against agribusiness giant Cargill, Inc., for unlawfully marketing certain turkey products. The complaint, filed with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), focuses on certain representations Cargill makes about its turkey products sold under the brand names ‘Shady Brook Farms’ and ‘Honeysuckle White.’
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NOVEMBER
Nine months after the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a pandemic, Animal Equality releases a new investigation that shows China’s wet markets are still in operation. The footage was filmed in China in May 2020, with the help of local activists, and reveals that despite the pandemic, live animal markets continue to sell exotic animals, bringing together species that in nature would never live together.
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OCTOBER
In collaboration with The Daily Mail, the UK’s most widely read newspaper, Animal Equality UK releases a new investigation with distressing scenes of animal suffering covertly filmed inside Kinswood Eggs, an egg farm in West Sussex, England. The farm, which supplies a number of UK wholesalers and local catering companies, confines around 320,000 hens who lay a staggering 72 million eggs every single year.
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OCTOBER
Animal Equality Spain releases a new investigation that depicts the brutality and mistreatment suffered by animals exported from Spain during transport and slaughter. The investigation, carried out by Animals International and Animal Welfare Foundation, and in collaboration with Animal Equality and Compassion in World Farming, reveals the enormous suffering of live animals during their transport from Spain, as well as the cruelty of their killing in the slaughterhouses of Lebanon.
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SEPTEMBER
Animal Equality launches a campaign targeting meal service companies Gooble, Home Chef, and Yumble for their lack of a public commitment to higher animal welfare in their chicken supply chains. The campaign includes petitions calling on company executives to take animal welfare seriously by making a public commitment to higher animal protection standards that would reduce the suffering of potentially millions of chickens killed for their menu items.
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AUGUST
Animal Equality, as part of a coalition, files an emergency petition with the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) to prevent COVID-19 relief funds, resources, and any other forms of support from facilitating or compensating for the costs of ventilation shutdown or water-based foam “depopulation” — the mass killing of animals on factory farms.
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AUGUST
Animal Equality releases distressing scenes of severe animal suffering on eight UK chicken farms, with undercover filming revealing hundreds of birds suffering agonizing deaths each day. Some of the farms are operated by Moy Park, one of the UK’s largest chicken producers and a known supplier of McDonald’s, as well as to UK supermarkets such as Tesco and Ocado. The investigation was featured as an exclusive in The Independent.
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AUGUST
In an effort to denounce the serious environmental risks caused by pig farms in Mexico, Animal Equality releases a short investigative documentary titled Enemy of the Planet. The film showcases footage taken by drones that flew over two industrial pig farms in Jalisco, with the goal of publicizing the damage caused by industrial livestock farming.
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JULY
In footage captured by Animal Equality investigators in Brazil, animals raised for human consumption are shown being treated cruelly on industrial farms in Brazil. The investigation, with a version narrated in Portuguese by Brazilian actress Ellen Jabour, shows pigs being abused and exposes the unsanitary conditions of industrial pig farms.
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JULY
Thanks to the work of Animal Equality Mexico, a new animal protection regulation has been approved by the Government Council of Zapopan, Mexico that establishes protections for farmed animals and criminalizes farmed animal cruelty.
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JUNE
Animal Equality, along with Spanish online newspaper Público, releases an investigation into a factory farm in Spain that documents the cruelty of the environment and rapid growth that chickens suffer for Spanish meat production.
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MAY
Animal Equality’s corporate outreach work in Spain has led to a decreased percentage of caged hens, with a new report showing that 77% of hens were caged in 2019, compared to 93% in 2017 when the team’s work began.
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MAY
A new investigation into live transport from Animal Equality Spain shows the pain and torment of lambs as they are shipped to countries without animal protections to be violently slaughtered without stunning.
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APRIL
In a historic move, Animal Equality presents two groundbreaking legislative initiatives in Mexico: One to ban the sale of live animals in the country’s markets and another to mandate the closure of all illegal slaughterhouses, as well as prosecute those who operate the underground facilities.
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APRIL
Footage from Animal Equality’s investigative work into Asia’s wet markets is featured on CBS’ news program 60 Minutes, reaching over 9 million viewers, nationwide.
APRIL
In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, Animal Equality launches an international campaign to ban wet markets across the world, with a petition addressed to the United Nations eclipsing 450K signatures in just a few weeks.
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MARCH
After Joaquin Phoenix’s stirring speech at the 2020 Academy Awards, during which he brought attention to the plight of dairy cows and calves, Animal Equality purchases a billboard in Hollywood to further shine a light on the horrors of the dairy industry.
FEBRUARY
Joaquin Phoenix joins Animal Equality for a protest in London in advance of the 73rd BAFTA awards for a daring action to draw attention to animal agriculture being a leading cause of climate change.
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FEBRUARY
A new investigation from Animal Equality reveals thousands of animals were again mutilated and slaughtered at a 2020 Gadhimai festival event.
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JANUARY
Animal Equality Germany’s newly formed corporate outreach team records its first success, with its work leading to French restaurant conglomerate Grouple Le Duff and its German subsidiary Kamps to join the European Chicken Commitment.
2019
December
Animal rights activist and actress Rooney Mara joins Animal Equality for an investigation called “With My Own Eyes,” going inside two factory farms to reveal animals living in horrific conditions.
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December
Animal Equality works with local authorities to end animal sacrifice at the Gadhimai festival, where every five years tens of thousands of animals are violently transported and brutally killed during the two-day event held in Southern Nepal.
November
Animal Equality releases its second investigation of 2019 in Mexico, focusing on the country’s illegal backyard slaughterhouses and bringing to light the cruel treatment and slaughter of lambs and sheep.
November
An investigation from Animal Equality filmed inside a British sheep slaughterhouse is released and details unimaginable cruelty and immense suffering at Farmers Fresh Wales, a supplier for customers in the U.K. and across continental Europe.
October
Animal Equality releases a new investigation which documents the horrors of buffalo mozzarella production in Italy, showing intense suffering including male buffalos left to die of hunger and thirst after being torn from their mothers.
October
After devastating fires set by cattle farmers destroyed large areas of the Amazon Rainforest, Animal Equality sent investigators to Northern Brazil to document the area’s increased deforestation and the connection to animal agriculture.
September
With Just Salad announcing a commitment to use only cage-free eggs by 2024, our U.S. corporate outreach department has now secured 6 total commitments from major corporations in 2019. Thanks to our work, Just Salad joins Dennys, Sun Basket, Blue Sushi, Legends Hospitality, and &pizza in adopting policies that eliminate some of the cruelest farming practices.
August
Animal Equality Italy releases a horrifying new video with scenes shot inside an Italian slaughterhouse showing the brutal killing of pigs. As a result, a petition circulates to obtain, among other things, the installation of closed-circuit television cameras in Italian slaughterhouses. The petition generates over 140,000 signatures in just a few weeks.
August
In collaboration with other animal protection organizations, Animal Equality files an amicus brief in the District of Columbia Court of Appeals in support of the Animal Legal Defense Fund’s false-advertising lawsuit against Hormel Foods, which alleges the company is misleading consumers through deceptive marketing.
July
In collaboration with Italy’s national media outlet, Tg2, Animal Equality publishes an investigation exposing atrocities inside a Northern Italy pig farm.
July
Animal Equality’s first U.S. investigation is released showing shocking cruelty at a calf ranch that supplies Bel Brands, producer of Babybel.
July
Animal Equality co-represents nonprofit consumer groups in a lawsuit filed against Tyson alleging deceptive marketing practices.
July
Animal Equality releases an investigation that reveals cruel and illegal practices at egg farms across India.
JUNE
Animal Equality, joined by a trio of public interest groups, challenges Arkansas’ Ag-Gag law in an effort to remove the veil of secrecy over the state’s factory farms.
JUNE
Animal Equality UK releases a new investigation with footage of horrifying conditions and extreme animal suffering on three chicken farms in Lincolnshire, England.
MAY
Started in 2018, Animal Equality’s U.S. corporate outreach department records its first two successes, as its collaborative work leads to commitments from Denny’s and Sun Basket to eliminate some of the worst abuses endured by chickens in the companies’ meat supply chains.
MAY
Animal Equality releases a new investigation showing footage of extreme suffering, cannibalism and abuse on farms supplying chickens to the restaurant chain Nando’s, and retailers Lidl and Asda in the UK.
APRIL
In response to Animal Equality’s year of campaigning in Jalisco and the findings of our investigation into the State’s slaughterhouses, lawmakers approved Jalisco Without Cruelty, a historic initiative making cruelty to farmed animals in the State a crime.
MARCH
Animal Equality collaborates with VICE Spain on a project called “Uncaged”, which will inform VICE’s Spanish audience on our work and current campaigns in the country.
FEBRUARY
Animal Equality launches Jalisco Without Cruelty, a new campaign to change animal protection laws in Jalisco, Mexico, and asks lawmakers to pass legislation that would make cruelty against farmed animals in the state a crime.
FEBRUARY
Thanks to Animal Equality’s 2018 investigation of Fir Tree Farm in Lincolnshire, UK, three of the pig farm’s workers are convicted of multiple animal cruelty offenses and sentenced for their crimes.
FEBRUARY
Working with the Italian animal protection organization ENPA, Animal Equality persuades/pressures Italian chicken producer Amadori to change its advertising language as it was not reflective of the terrible living conditions of the chickens killed for Amadori products.
FEBRUARY
Animal Equality is named co-council for Food and Water Watch and the Organic Consumers Association in their lawsuit against Pilgrim’s Pride alleging false advertising in relation to the treatment of the chickens killed for Pilgrim’s products.
JANUARY
In the U.S., Animal Equality helps defeat the King Amendment, which threatened to prohibit states from passing new animal protection laws and would have negated existing state laws protecting animals.
JANUARY
In Italy, Animal Equality releases a petition against cruelty in slaughterhouses addressed to the ministers of Health and Agriculture wand reaches 120,000 signatures in just a few hours.
2018
DECEMBER
Animal Equality’s corporate outreach department, created in the fall of 2016, reaches a milestone with 100 policies won that ban cages for egg-laying hens across Spain, Italy, Brazil, Mexico, and India.
DECEMBER
In Mexico, Animal Equality releases a new investigation, presented by activist and actor Eugenio Derbez,exposing the cruel conditions that more than 200 million caged hens are living in.
DECEMBER
Animal Equality is named a Top Charity by Animal Charity Evaluators for the fourth year in a row.
NOVEMBER
Co-Founder and President Sharon Núñez is featured in one of the most widely circulated newspapers in Spain, El Pais.
NOVEMBER
Love Veg launches in Spain.
NOVEMBER
Animal Equality delivers 200,000 petition signatures to the German parliament calling for the end of cruel castration to piglets without anesthesia.
NOVEMBER
After Animal Equality helped to gather over 600,000 signatures in support of Prop 12, the ballot measure passes in the 2018 U.S. election cycle, ending cages for farmed animals in California and other states.
NOVEMBER
Actor and animal advocate Peter Egan joins Animal Equality to deliver 100,000 signatures demanding a UK foie gras import ban to Prime Minister Theresa May, with coverage in the Huffington Post and El País. Several restaurants, including at Tate Modern, drop foie gras from their menus.
OCTOBER
Animal Equality’s annual gala is held in Los Angeles and honors Kat Von D (Animal Hero Award), Nic Adler (Vegan Trailblazer) and Beyond Meat’s Ethan Brown (Compassionate Company Award). It features a special performance by Renee Olstead and is covered by Vogue magazine.
OCTOBER
Together with 130 European animal rights organizations, Animal Equality launches the End the Cage Age campaign demanding the European Parliament definitively ban the use of cages throughout the European Union.
SEPTEMBER
Love Veg launches in Mexico with a new digital cookbook focusing on egg replacementsIn the first month alone, the e-book is downloaded 71 thousand times.
SEPTEMBER
In Italy, Animal Equality releases a new investigation in collaboration with Italian state-owned television channel Tg2, exposing the horrible conditions that hundreds of thousands of hens used for eggs endure in factory farms.
AUGUST
A shocking investigation released by Animal Equality in the UK and covered by the Daily Mirror, shows workers at Coombe Farm in Somerset aggressively beating dairy cows.
AUGUST
Activist and actor Edie Falco, as well as ad her son, join Animal Equality in protest of an iconic McDonald’s restaurant in New York City’s Times Square.
AUGUST
Our undercover investigation in Italy gains exclusive access to a Sardinian fishing boat, exposing intensive trawling on the Mediterranean Sea while showing the atrocities of large-scale commercial fishing.
JULY
Footage released by Animal Equality from a UK investigation shows the abuse of pigs on Fir Tree Pig Farm in Lincolnshire, with coverage on the front page of The Times newspaper.
JULY
Animal Equality joins forces with other McDonald’s coalition members to commission a digital ad in New York City’s Times Square that depicts the abuse of chickens on farms like those supplying McDonald’s. The ad ran for six months and reached an estimated one million people per day.
JULY
Dulce Ramírez, Animal Equality’s Executive DIrector in Mexico, is featured in the Unbound Project, which celebrates women at the forefront of advocacy.
JULY
In support of our McDonald’s campaign, Animal Equality joins coalition members and 250+ activists to peacefully protest in front of a McDonald’s restaurant in Los Angeles.
JUNE
Animal Equality staff are selected to present at the annual Animal Rights Conference.
MAY
Animal Equality UK releases shocking scenes of animal abuse filmed on Fir Tree pig farm in Lincolnshire, which is owned by Elsham Linc – one of Britain’s largest pig producers.
MAY
Animal Equality executes the first investigation into the Mexican chicken industry exposing the suffering of these animals at hatcheries, farms, during transportation and at slaughterhouses.
APRIL
In April 2018, Animal Equality releases a new investigation exposing cruelty inside inside Italian chicken hatcheries.
APRIL
Britain’s best-known birder and national treasure, Bill Oddie OBE, joins MPs and Animal Equality campaigners to call on Michael Gove, Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs of the United Kingdom, to ‘Make Britain Foie Gras-Free’ as they hand over 70,000 signatures backing an import ban post-Brexit.
MARCH
Animal Equality kicks off a campaign to help chickens exploited for McDonald’s with a full-page open letter in The New York Times.
MARCH
Noble Foods, the UK’s biggest egg producer, announces a commitment to cage-free egg production by 2025. The decision, which will reduce the suffering of millions of birds every year, came after an Animal Equality investigation inside one of its suppliers.
MARCH
Animal Equality visits SXSW in Texas – one of the world’s most important interactive film, and music festivals – to show iAnimal to hundreds of attendees.
MARCH
Animal Equality releases an investigation into the cruel Italian rabbit meat industry, which routinely ignores the rules and regulations established to minimize animal suffering during the cruel slaughter process.
FEBRUARY
In collaboration with the Spanish TV program Salvados, Animal Equality reveals devastating scenes of extreme animal suffering on a Spanish pig farm which supplies El Pozo – a sausage brand stocked by major retailers.
JANUARY
Animal Equality presents an investigation inside pig slaughterhouses in Italy.
JANUARY
Faunalytics and Animal Equality release a study on the impact of video outreach on meat reduction
2017
DECEMBER
Animal Equality is named a Top Charity by Animal Charity Evaluators.
DECEMBER
Our investigators infiltrated the Italian lamb meat industry showing images of one of the roughly 200 abattoirs that are allowed to slaughter animals without pre-stunning.
OCTOBER
Alongside Mexican TV personality Marco Antonio Regil, Animal Equality presents an exhibition in the Mexican Senate showing photographs inside Mexican farms and slaughterhouses, as well as presenting its virtual reality project to Senators in Mexico.
SEPTEMBER
Animal Equality presents a nationwide investigation in India exposing the cruel and illegal practices in hen and chicken farms. A report and a list of recommendations based on the footage obtained were included in the Law Commission’s proposed- Egg Laying Hen Rules and Broiler Chicken Rules, 2017.
SEPTEMBER
Animal Equality brought to the European Parliament in Brussels its complaint about the mistreatment of farm animals with an exhibition entitled «Industrial Livestock: the biggest crime of our time?». The exhibition showed images of factory farms in Spain, England, and Germany.
SEPTEMBER
Animal Equality investigators discover calves caged in tiny pens far past the eight-week legal limit on a UK dairy farm that supplies M&S, resulting in international media coverage. The RSPCA was called in to inspect all dairy farms supplying M&S.
JULY
iAnimal – The Dairy Industry in 360º. iAnimal takes on the cruel dairy industry with its third film in the series, narrated by actor Evanna Lynch. Witness the secretive industry like never before.
JULY
Animal Equality uses drones to expose the devastating environmental impacts of factory farming. Our footage showed facilities across Catalonia, Spain full of toxic waste that is harming nearby residents and animals.
JULY
New investigation from Animal Equality brings to light the horrific and illegal cruelties inflicted on egg-laying hens in India.
JULY
Animal Equality introduces legal initiative to criminalize animal abuse in Mexican state of Jalisco.
JULY
Celebrities and politicians join Animal Equality’s campaign for a #FoieGrasFreeGB, demanding that the UK Parliament bans the importation of foie gras on the day we exit the EU.
MAY
Animal Equality Releases its first investigation inside Brazil’s egg factory farms.
MAY
Following our undercover investigations we decide to team up with the famous Italian actor to launch a video message to protect lambs during easter holidays.
MAY
India introduces new rules, based on findings by Animal Equality, that prohibit the sale of cows and buffaloes at the nation’s animal markets.
MAY
Thanks to footage taken by Animal Equality, a dairy farm worker in Somerset pled guilty to two counts of animal cruelty and received a 12 month suspended prison sentence, a two-year ban on working with animals and a fine.
MAY
Animal Equality releases shocking pictures from a chicken factory farm in Lower Saxony, Germany. The tragic fate of the chick Finn causes a stir nationwide.
MARCH
The European Parliament approves an initiative by MEP Stefan Eck aimed at ending cages for rabbits raised by the meat industry. Animal Equality supported the initiative with #BanRabbitCages.
MARCH
Legislation introduced in the Mexican Senate, on behalf of Animal Equality, will criminalize cruelty to farmed animals at the federal level and hold accountable those who abuse them.
MARCH
Animal Equality visted several farms across Mexico and documented systemic cruelty in the dairy industry. Our investigation revealed painful mutilations and forced pregnancies.
FEBRUARY
Shocking investigation inside the egg industry get a massive media exposure, following this investigation the selling of eggs dropped for an entire week according to the ‘Asso Avi’ president of the Italian egg industry.
2016
DECEMBER
Our second 360º virtual reality film, 42 Days, takes a behind the scenes look into the lives of chickens raised for meat. It is presented and narrated by Kat Von D.
NOVEMBER
Animal Equality celebrates 10 incredible years of helping animals thanks to the compassion of our supporters.
NOVEMBER
Animal Equality opens office in Brazil. Animal Equality’s Executive Director in Brazil is Vivian Mocellin.
NOVEMBER
An extensive undercover investigation by Animal Equality inside 31 slaughterhouses in seven different states in Mexico reveals extreme cruelty against animals.
OCTOBER
Animal Equality launches the first film in its iAnimal virtual reality film series. Presented and narrated by artist and musician Tony Kanal.
OCTOBER
Animal Equality Mexico releases a shocking investigation into battery-cage egg farms, the first investigation ever conducted inside factory farms in Mexico.
OCTOBER
An Animal Equality investigation uncovers violent abuse of cows and their calves on a family-run British dairy farm.
SEPTEMBER
Four years after Animal Equality revealed some of the most severe animal cruelty ever witnessed on the El Escobar pig farm in Spain, the trial against the four defendants finds them guilty and sentences them to prison.
AUGUST
During an investigation into British chicken farms, Animal Equality investigators rescue a weak young bird who had been thrown into the rubbish skip still alive. She was taken to an animal sanctuary and named Gloria – and she survived!
JUNE
Animal Equality presents evidence in the EU Parliament from our investigations into rabbit farms, supporting a campaign to ban the battery-cage farming of rabbits.
APRIL
New investigation reveals the suffering of rabbits during live export and the slaughtering in Italy.
MARCH
For the third year in a row, Animal Equality is recognized by Animal Charity Evaluators for efficient work to help animals.
JANUARY
Animal Equality investigators expose squalor and suffering on award-winning British pig farms linked to major supermarkets.
JANUARY
Animal Equality’s virtual reality project iAnimal celebrates its international premiere during the prestigious Sundance Film Festival in the USA.
2015
DECEMBER
For the second year in a row, Animal Equality is chosen as a ‘Top Charity’ by Animal Charity Evaluators and recognized as one of the three most efficient animal rights organizations in the world.
NOVEMBER
Animal Equality conducts the first investigation inside industrial chicken hatcheries in Spain and documents the merciless treatment of millions of tiny chicks. Several tens of millions of people have seen the video on the internet.
NOVEMBER
An Animal Equality investigation in China reveals the brutal killing of dogs for their skins.
SEPTEMBER
In September 2015, Animal Equality focuses its efforts on farmed animals. As an animal protection organization we want to make sure that our resources are being used to end the worst forms of animal suffering.
SEPTEMBER
We started our first program at Mexican universities, delivering free vegetarian guides to students from different universities in Mexico.
JUNE
Animal Equality collaborates with an Italian TV program to show millions of people shocking cruelty in several Italian pig farms and slaughterhouses.
MAY
Animal Equality uncovers cruel conditions in two organic laying hen farms that supply to Deutsche Frühstücksei GmbH, Germany’s largest egg producer.
APRIL
The Mexican state of Jalisco prohibits the use of animals in circuses thanks to an initiative presented by Animal Equality and supported by local groups.
MARCH
Animal Equality rescues several animals from the Italian lamb meat industry, including little Basilico.
FEBRUARY
After an Animal Equality investigation, Mexico’s Office of Environmental Protection seized over 100 animals from a decrepit zoo called “Club of the Little Animals.”
2014
DECEMBER
Animal Equality investigates German duck farms and the country’s largest suppliers are forced to close for several months. Workers face possible legal consequences.
DECEMBER
On the heels of its investigations inside the lamb industry Animal Equality Italy exposed the suffering behind live animals transport direct to the slaughterhouses and rescue two lambs during the investigation.
DECEMBER
After an Animal Equality investigation into rabbit farms in Spain and Italy, The Terrace restaurant in London stops offering rabbit meat on their menus.
NOVEMBER
In November 2014, two of Animal Equality’s international directors Sharon Núñez and Jose Valle incorporated Animal Equality as a non-profit (501c3) in the United States.
SEPTEMBER
Due to the initiative presented by Animal Equality in October 2013 and with the collaboration of other local associations, Guadalajara city in Mexico prohibits the exhibition and use of animals of any kind in circus shows.
AUGUST
Animal Equality in Germany reveals what lies behind the promise of German meat company Edeka’s seemingly transparent branded meat program.
AUGUST
The Indian Ministry of Foreign Affairs passes a nationwide ban on the importation of foie gras as a direct result of Animal Equality’s investigations.
MAY
Animal Equality investigates more than 70 facilities across Europe that breed or raise rabbits for meat.
MAY
In a landmark victory, a nationwide ban on all performances of bulls, including bullock cart races, was introduced by the Supreme Court in May 2014 following the efforts of Animal Equality and other groups.
MAY
A directive issued by India’s Ministry of Home Affairs reduces the number of large animals killed at the cruel festival of Gadhimai by 80%. The directive was issued after requests by Animal Equality.
MAY
For the first time ever coinciding with the celebration of the “Eid al-Adha”, also called the “Feast of the Sacrifice”, Animal Equality exposes to the public the extreme cruelty within the Halal meat industry in Italy.
APRIL
After investigations by Animal Equality, the consumption of lamb meat in Italy drops by 40% in 2014, and a further 50% the following year.
APRIL
A groundbreaking investigation filmed with hidden cameras showed once again the cruelty of lamb industry in Italy. The investigators got unprecedented footage of slaughterhouses and lamb weighing. After this exposé 6 to 10 Italian families ditch lamb meat for good during easter holidays.
APRIL
Animal Equality is chosen as a ‘Top Charity’ by Animal Charity Evaluators and recognized as one of the three most efficient animal rights organizations in the world.
MARCH
More than one hundred people gather in front of the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin to commemorate all those animals who suffer in factory farming and die.
2013
OCTOBER
Animal Equality’s investigations in China contributed in collaboration with other organizations to the Chinese authorities closing a dog slaughterhouse and 33 dog and cat meat vendors.
SEPTEMBER
In the summer of 2013, Animal Equality rescues six hens from an egg factory farm in Germany.
JULY
Thirteen circuses were investigated in the state of Jalisco which led to the confiscation of animals in very bad condition, and two initiatives prohibiting circuses in Guadalajara and Jalisco.
MAY
Animal Equality’s investigators rescued Vita, a dog used for breeding, from a slaughterhouse in China and took her to Europe where she gave birth to nine babies a short time later.
APRIL
Animal Equality conducts the first widespread investigation into the dog meat trade in China. An investigator from Animal Equality Germany films at China’s dog markets and slaughterhouses.
MARCH
An investigation by Animal Equality Italy reveals unprecedented images of cruelty to lambs in farms and slaughterhouses. Following this investigation, lamb meat consumption decreased during Easter holidays.
MARCH
Over a period of ten months, Animal Equality investigates the zoo Schwaben Park and documents the suffering of the chimpanzees held there.
FEBRUARY
Animal Equality releases images from an investigation into the a monkey breeding facility. The animals were sold for vivisection labs across the world.
2012
DECEMBER
After the release of new footage inside foie-gras farms, the third best restaurant in the world, Mugaritz, is fined for using foie-gras coming from illegal farms.
DECEMBER
Animal Equality organizes the first congress against repression in Spain.
DECEMBER
Animal Equality fills the center of Madrid with crosses in remembrance of the animals victims of human abuse.
DECEMBER
Animal Equality organizes its fifth Animal Rights Day in the center of Madrid.
DECEMBER
Over 60 activists gathered in front of the Pantheon to commemorate the International Animal Rights Day. First action of this type in Italy. The demonstration got international media coverage.
NOVEMBER
Animal Equality’s suggestion of a sensor device to prevent elephant deaths due to train accidents was accepted by the Government of India. The device has been developed and is in experimental stage as of October 2016.
NOVEMBER
After another foie gras investigation by Animal Equality, the largest supermarket chain in Italy, COOP, decides to end the sale of foie gras.
NOVEMBER
An Animal Equality investigation into British pig farms results in the closure of Harling Farm and the prosecution of its workers for animal cruelty. They receive the longest sentence ever handed down for abuse of farmed animals.
SEPTEMBER
Animal Equality started working in Mexico in 2012. Animal Equality’s Executive Director in Mexico and now Vice President for Latino America is Dulce Ramírez.
JULY
Animal Equality begins many years of investigations into the foie gras industry. Our petition against foie gras production has reached 100,000 signatures to date.
JUNE
Animal Equality presents an investigation uncovering the cruelty behind the capturing and killing of Tuna in Carloforte, Italy.
MAY
Animal Equality Germany is incorporated to defend animals in the country.
APRIL
A crowded march against the use of animals in experiments brings hundreds of people together to fight the use of animals in laboratories.
MARCH
Human Meat Tray Demo in Barcelona, Spain.
JANUARY
On January 14th 2012, Animal Equality was registered as an organization in Italy. Animal Equality’s Executive Director in Italy is Matteo Cupi.
2011
DECEMBER
For its fourth Animal Rights Day, Animal Equality brings hundreds of activists together in Madrid.
NOVEMBER
Hundreds of people join Animal Equality to protest fur farming.
NOVEMBER
Animal Equality exposes the cruelty behind ritual killings in Melilla.
SEPTEMBER
Animal Equality releases an investigation inside ten Spanish zoos. The investigation gains national attention and sparks a national debate in Spain about zoos and aquariums.
SEPTEMBER
For the fourth year in a row, Animal Equality films the killing of a bull with spears in Tordesillas, Spain.
JUNE
Animal Equality continues its work in London to educate people about the benefits of plant-based eating.
FEBRUARY
March against animal experiments in Catalonia, Spain.
JANUARY
Animal Equality started working in India in 2011. Animal Equality’s Executive Director in India is Amruta Ubale.
2010
DECEMBER
Animal Equality commemorates Animal Rights Day with a shocking action at Leicester Square in London, United Kingdom.
SEPTEMBER
Animal Equality rescues five hens from a factory farm in Spain. The organization is joined by animal activist and photographer Jo-Anne McArthur.
SEPTEMBER
For the third year in a row, Animal Equality releases hidden-camera footage of one of Spain’s cruelest bullfighting event, Toro de la Vega.
MAY
Animal Equality presents its second investigation into Spanish pig farms. The organization released a detailed investigation covering over 172 facilities. The images captured by the organization were released in prime-time on Spanish television.
MARCH
Animal Equality carries out another shocking action against bullfighting. The organization lowers a banner in Puente de Segovia, Spain.
FEBRUARY
A protest against fur farming brings hundreds of people together in Madrid.
FEBRUARY
Animal Equality carries out its second cat-walk disruption in Madrid, Spain to protest against the cruelty of the fur industry.
JANUARY
Dozens of activists protest inside a fur shop in Madrid, Spain.
2009
DECEMBER
For its second Animal Rights Day, Animal Equality brings together hundreds of activists from different European countries.
DECEMBER
Animal Equality carries out the first open rescue of lambs in Spain during Christmas Eve. The rescue is lived streamed becoming the first lived stream open rescue to be carried out.
OCTOBER
Animal Equality presents its first investigation inside the fur industry. The organization releases footage inside several Spanish fur farms.
OCTOBER
On October 16th, 2009 Animal Equality registered as a non-profit limited company (and in 2017 as a charity) in the UK.
SEPTEMBER
Animal Equality releases hidden-camera footage of one of Spain’s bullfighting event, Toro de la Vega, getting major media coverage and initiating a discussion in the Spanish Congress about the abolition of this event.
APRIL
Animal Equality lowers a banner against bullfighting in Seville.
FEBRUARY
Animal Equality carries out its first cat-walk disruption in Madrid, Spain to protest against the cruelty of the fur industry.
FEBRUARY
Animal Equality carries out an impactful protest against the fur industry. Several volunteers and two of the co-founders of the organization chain themselves to a fur stall during the biggest fur fair in Spain. The action is covered by Spanish national television reaching millions of people.
FEBRUARY
Animal Equality carries a protest against a judge who was shown hunting in the media.
JANUARY
Animal Equality carries out a protest against fur in a shopping mall in Seville, Spain.
2008
DECEMBER
In 2008, Animal Equality carried out its first investigation inside Spanish slaughterhouses. Jose Valle, who would become Animal Equality’s Director of Investigations and later Executive Vice President, visited five slaughterhouses in northern Spain and the images were shown in the media.
DECEMBER
Animal Equality rescues ten hens from a factory farm in Spain. The rescue of animals was viewed on television by over 2.5 million people on Spanish TV.
DECEMBER
Animal Equality commemorates Animal Rights Day in Madrid by honoring animals who suffer in factory farms and slaughterhouses. This action has been replicated by Animal Equality and other organizations around the world.
OCTOBER
Animal Equality activists jump into a bullring in Zaragoza, Spain, to protest the killing of bulls for entertainment.
OCTOBER
Animal Equality protests bullfighting in Zaragoza, Spain, by lowering a banner from the cities largest bullring. The action was covered by Spanish national television, as well as local papers, and reached millions of people.
SEPTEMBER
Animal Equality protests one of the most horrific bullfighting events in Spain by showing a banner that read “Respect Animals” from the sky.
SEPTEMBER
Animal Equality uses undercover hidden cameras to film the killing of a bull in Tordesillas, Spain.
AUGUST
Animal Equality carries out and presents its first investigation into pig farms. The footage revealed by the organization showed the conditions suffered by pigs in Spain in a farm-related with Campofrio, one of Spain’s biggest meat producers.
JULY
Animal Equality protests one of the biggest meat companies in Spain, Campofrio, by carrying out a protest at their headquarters.
JUNE
Animal Equality lowers a banner reading “Bullfighting Abolition” from Barcelona’s bullfighting ring, La Monumental. Nowadays, bullfighting is banned in Catalonia and the building is used for comercial and cultural events.
MAY
Animal Equality lowers two banners from the world’s most important bullring that read “Abolition.”
APRIL
Animal Equality displays a banner at one of Spain’s biggest symbols, the Osborne bull.
MARCH
Animal Equality protests the killing of seals in Canada at the Canadian embassy in Madrid.
2007
SEPTEMBER
In 2007 Animal Equality carried out its first open rescue. Animal Equality was the first organization in Europe to carry out an open rescue. Six pigs were rescued from a factory farm in Spain and brought to a sanctuary. Since its foundation Animal Equality has carried out many open rescues, saving over 100 animals.
MARCH
Animal Equality protests the killing of seals in Canada at the Canadian embassy in Madrid.
FEBRUARY
Animal Equality protests the use of animals in circuses in Madrid, Spain.
2006
NOVEMBER
Animal Equality uses a shocking action to represent the need for consumers to reject meat and other animal products. This protest has been replicated by organizations around the world.
OCTOBER
Animal Equality starts working in Latin America. The organization creates groups of activists in different countries who carry out protests and distribute pro-veg leaflets.
OCTOBER
Protest in Japanese embassy on killing of dolphins in Japan every year.
SEPTEMBER
Animal Equality’s first action was shocking and gained a great amount of media attention. Two of Animal Equality’s founders, as well as two other activists, chained themselves to the entrance of a slaughterhouse in Madrid, Spain.
Animal Equality was founded in 2006 by Sharon Núñez, Jose Valle and Javier Moreno in Spain. Animal Equality’s mission is a world where all animals are respected and protected.
