Cargill extends its commitment to animal welfare with training for emergency responders

Learn how Cargill's commitment to animal welfare and humane animal handling extends to emergency situations while hauling livestock. 

With more than 100 trucks delivering hogs daily to each of Cargill’s pork facilities in Beardstown, Illinois, and Ottumwa, Iowa, accidents occasionally happen, especially in inclement weather. Preparing for accidents illustrates Cargill’s commitment in extending animal welfare and humane animal handling practices from start to finish, regardless of everyday circumstances or unexpected occurrences.

Training on humane handling of animals in accidents

Cargill Pork’s training sessions are for those who may be called to act should there be an accident while hauling livestock. Local first responders and livestock industry colleagues learn how to humanely handle live hogs at the site of a transportation accident.

Cargill has teamed with renowned animal welfare expert Jennifer Woods for more than five years on training Cargill personnel and first responders in accident response and hog euthanasia.

A recent November training session, held at the Beardstown facility, was attended by members of the Beardstown Police Department, officials from the Illinois Department of Agriculture and the United States Department of Agriculture.

Training session attendees learn how to secure an accident site, ensure human and animal safety, cut open a livestock trailer to extract live animals and euthanize injured hogs humanely.

Cargill also maintains five rescue units throughout the United States Midwest to respond to livestock transit accidents. Recently, a Cargill team responded to the Macomb, Illinois accident and was cited by the Macomb deputy police chief for excellent work in handling a precarious situation.

Building a network for humane animal handling

Around the central part of the United States, more than 150 individuals have been trained by Cargill, including local and state law enforcement officers, local fire fighters and area transporters.

Cargill continues to plan more training sessions to ensure that, when the unexpected happens, employees and first responders can be as prepared as possible.