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Quality needs compassion

Not only do cows enjoy fresh air, sunlight and room to move about, but they can choose their own social groups when grazing. Untethered cows with outdoor access can perform their natural behaviours and are at less risk of lameness and mastitis.

Despite this, most of the cows farmed to make Parmesan cheese, renowned as a ‘premium’ product and an example of Italian ‘excellence’, never set foot on grass. Many are likely tethered to a post in their shed, unable to move freely.

Can you imagine how sad it must be to be kept permanently indoors and have never seen a blade of grass? Can you imagine how terrible it must be to be unable to move around because of a tether around your neck?

This must change now

Take part in the social storm to demand urgent action from the Parmesan Consortium.

Let’s tell Parmesan that their cows cannot wait any longer – they deserve a life that is worth living!

Brown dairy cow indoors. If you are the one and only you can do better for cows
dairy cows outside. Most of them never set foot on grass
a tiny percentage of dairy cows have access to pasture
parmesan cows can be tethered like this

Act now

I care about animal welfare and am shocked to hear that only a small percentage of your cows have access to pasture, and many are likely tethered to a post in their shed. I expect concrete and binding commitments from your Consortium to tackle these issues. Parmesan, #YouCanDoBetter! #NotOnMyPasta ciwf.org.uk/Not-On-My-Pasta

We must be firm in our protest, but please be polite and use non-offensive language to ensure this call for change is taken into consideration.

  • If you are on Instagram, please use the same text to comment under the last post on their official Instagram page.
  • If you are on Twitter, please send a tweet tagging Parmesan’s official Twitter page.

If you are not on Facebook and Twitter, or don’t want to use social media, you can also email the Parmesan Consortium and ask them to really improve their animal welfare standards. Animals cannot wait any longer! Act now.

OUR ASKS

It is unacceptable for Parmesan to market their product as ‘premium’ if its farmers continue to ignore the most basic needs of their animals, such as the ability to move freely or to graze on pasture.

Four years on from a Compassion investigation that exposed the cruelty behind Parmesan, the cows can no longer wait.

We call on the Consortium to publicly commit to:

  • Phasing-out the cruel and obsolete system of tethering.
  • Put in place a roadmap to progressively guarantee access to at least 120 days of grazing per year for all the cows in its supply chain.

Over 90,000 emails of protest have been sent to the Parmesan Consortium so far. We will continue to put pressure on Parmesan to really improve the animal welfare standards for cows.

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If you have any further questions regarding this, or any other matter, please get in touch with us at supporters@ciwf.org.uk. We aim to respond to all queries within two working days. However, due to the high volume of correspondence that we receive, it may occasionally take a little longer. Please do bear with us if this is the case. Alternatively, if your query is urgent, you can contact our Supporter Engagement Team on +44 (0)1483 521 953 (lines open Monday to Friday 9am to 5pm).