Representatives of the livestock and meat sector met with the President of the Parliament of Catalonia, Laura Borràs, to present the report In Self-Defense and ask her to value these activities in Catalonia. According to the organizations, food production is one of the main pillars of the country. For this reason, they are calling for a monograph on the agri-food sector to be held in Parliament.
Joan Carles Massot, national president of JARC; Pròsper Puig, president of the Catalan Federation of Butchers and Cansaladeria – Charcuterie; José Fríguls, president of ANAFRIC; and Ricard Parés, director of PORCAT (representing ANPROGAPOR, ASFAC, ASOPROVAC, ASSOCAT, FAC, FCAC, FECIC and FEGRAM) met with the President of the Parliament of Catalonia, Laura Borràs, to present the report In self-defense, prepared by 13 sector entities that carry out their activity in Catalonia, with the aim of asking them to defend and value the productive activity of livestock and the meat industry.
The signatory entities of the document are representative of the whole chain, from the production of feed, meat, farms, industries and processors. The common front of organizations in the meat and livestock sector emerged a few months ago as a result of the Barcelona City Council’s proposal to reduce meat consumption in school menus. This decision, according to the signatories, helped to strengthen the negative image of meat, which is often spread from different areas and has penetrated society.
Apart from personal choices, which are obviously always respectable, the sector considers it a mistake for the institutions to promote restrictive diets, which could have effects on children’s health, instead of betting on the Mediterranean diet, praised by be one of the most balanced and healthy in the world.
The sector has asked Laura Borràs, as President of the Parliament, who has the function of controlling the public audiovisual media of the Catalan Broadcasting Corporation (CCRTV), to work so that the Corporation dedicates more space to talk about the meat and livestock sector, giving voice to its representatives.
It would be a matter of breaking the “urbanite” view away from reality, which has a large part of society on these agri-food activities, and bring them closer not only to the small farmer and the bucolic image of the countryside, but to the reality of the production of ‘food and different livestock models. Therefore, the aim is for the media to spread a more realistic image of the sector and to make use of Catalan productive activity, which produces high quality food, following the strictest regulations in the world in terms of health, environment and animal welfare.
The Common Front argues that health, education and food are three basic pillars and therefore calls for Parliament to dedicate a monograph to Parliament on the agri-food sector to define policies that support these activities.
