Feel strongly about these letters, or any other aspects of the news? Share your views by emailing us your Letter to the Editor at [email protected] or filling in this Google form. Submissions should not exceed 400 words I note with great concern the plan, announced in the 2026-2027 budget speech, to build a
multi-storey pig farm in Hong Kong. The Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation Department (AFCD) says this industrial pig farm will be environmentally friendly. However, in actuality, such a project would be terrible with regard to animal welfare, the environment and public health.
To begin with, intensive pig farming is cruel; it often involves clipping the teeth and tails of piglets, and castrating them. These mutilations are often performed without anaesthetic and cause intense and sometimes chronic pain. Pigs are also confined in such cramped conditions that the ability to turn around or engage in natural behaviour is restricted. The proposal for “enclosed livestock farming buildings” means pigs might not get any natural sunlight or fresh air. Such conditions could lead to stress, proliferation of disease and higher death rates, and are unacceptable. This is blatant cruelty to animals.
In addition, an intensive pig farming operation is a major threat to public health. Residents living near industrial livestock farms often complain of rotten smells and suffer from respiratory diseases.
Zoonotic diseases might also spread, given the crowded conditions of intensive livestock operations. Swine and bird flu have already jumped from pigs and chickens and been
fatal to humans. Covid-19 is thought to have jumped from
bats to humans. Intensive livestock farms could be another pandemic waiting to happen.
Your
article (“Hong Kong launches 3-year action plan to help residents fight the flab”, March 4) noted that 51 per cent of Hongkongers are obese or overweight. Given this, the AFCD should consider promoting healthier plant-based diets instead of building a pig farm. Two better alternatives are hydroponic farming and developing plant-based meat alternatives.
