Welfare at slaughter

Animal welfare at the time of slaughter
In Denmark national legislation concerning ritual slaughter of animals without previous stunning is in force. However, for the time being, ritual slaughter is not carried out in Danish slaughterhouses. It is not allowed to perform ritual slaughter of ratites.
If animals, except poultry, are slaughtered without previous stunning, the slaughtering must be perfor-med at an export-authorized slaughterhouse, permanently supervised by an official veterinarian and the animals must be restrained in a proper way.
When ritual slaughter of poultry (except ratites) takes place, it must be supervised by an official veteri-narian and the animals must be manually restrained from the time of the neck-incision to the time of death.
The ritual slaughter of cattle additionally implies restraint of the animal in an upright position in an ad-justable box, in which the head and the body are fixed as gentle as possible, from the time of incision of the blood vessels to the time of death. The ritual slaughtering of cattle also implies stunning of the ani-mal with a captive bolt pistol immediately after the neck-incision in order to avoid unnecessary excite-ment, pain and suffering.