Eyes on Animals inspected Benelux’s largest rabbit slaughterhouse, located in Belgium but with 80% of its rabbits coming from the Netherlands. We were relieved that despite it being a halal plant, the rabbits are put through a stunner before being bled. The slaughter speed was also slow enough to give the stunners and cutters time to do their job properly without missing an animal and risking that he or she enter the butcher phase still conscious. The rabbits were in good condition and the plant was overall calm.
However, the gauge on one of the stunning machines was not working reliably and thus after our complaint the manager said he would have a technician come in. It is important that the gauge always work properly so the worker knows that the rabbits have been adequately stunned before having their throats cut. As well, several transport crates were broken, meaning that under the weight of the other stacked crates they could collapse and crush the animals inside during transport. The manager said that at a certain point he would repair them or discard them. We would like to thank the manager for opening the doors to us and taking action on our concerns.
