Six years of unnoticed non-compliance with animal welfare requirements in Chinese slaughterhouses

Question for written answer E-001691/2026
to the Commission
Rule 144
Jessika van Leeuwen (ECR)

Audit CT-2025-0037, published on 12 February 2026, found that animal welfare standards are systematically not being met in Chinese slaughterhouses: not a single slaughterhouse using electronic stunning methods had the monitoring equipment which has been required since 2019; in one slaughterhouse, a water bath for stunning designed for two animals was being used for ten at a time; and there was no procedure in place to reject batches in the event of animal welfare violations.

Shortcomings in traceability make it impossible to determine whether imported products meet EU standards, allowing non-compliant products to reach the EU market unhindered and at the expense of a level playing field. In the three months between the completion and publication of the report, exports appear to have continued unabated, under a certification system that the Commission itself has already deemed unreliable.

• 1.The Commission concludes that the shortcomings are systematic (conclusion 90) and that the certification system does not support the declarations made in Implementing Regulation (EU) 2020/2235 (conclusion 106). On what basis have products continued to enter the EU since that finding was made?
• 2.What objective criteria does the Commission use to determine when animal welfare guarantees from a third country are inadequate, and at what threshold does this lead to the suspension of imports?
• 3.The monitoring equipment, which has been mandatory since 2019, was missing at all the slaughterhouses inspected, without this having been identified in previous audits. How does the Commission explain that this shortcoming went unnoticed for six years?

Submitted: 24.4.2026