Ritual slaughter: regulatory responses, consumer choice and labelling strategies

Religious slaughter has always been a controversial and emotive subject from the viewpoint both of assuring animal welfare and of people’s cultural/religious rights. In practice, there is considerable variability in the approach taken to ritual slaughter, and no unambiguous and uniform approaches to its performance have been determined. This paper summaries the current legal situation relating to the performance of ritual slaughter in Italy and the associated scientific knowledge, and emphasises the importance of the introduction of a uniform system of certification/labelling of the products of ritual slaughter.