Uruguay | Colon | Slaughter horse collecting station | Horsemeat Import
Mare with two auction tags.
Mares and foals transported together.
When we arrive at the collecting station of horse dealer Riccetto at 18:30, there is only one horse in the holding pens. We guess that he must keep more horses at another place, being one of Clay’s largest suppliers. We drive around and look foranother field with horses, but without success. When we return to his collecting station at 19:00, a horse trailer is parked next to the pens and a group of mares and foals have just been unloaded. As the trailer has no dividers, it is evident that the mares and foals have been transported all together, what would be prohibited in the EU. We notice that one of the mares has two auction tags attached to her back, a new and an older one. This shows that she was brought from one auction to the other.
Riccetto lives next to the holding pens and comes over to talk to us. All the horses in this pen are mares, but he has more horses on other pastures. He explains that he sends horses to all three slaughterhouses, but works mainly with Clay. He buys horses at auctions but also from different farms. Riccetto states that when buyinghorses at an auction, it is difficult to know where they come from.
Some of the horses are brought to the auctions by their owners, but others are brought there in groups by horse dealers who bought them from different sources. In the second case, the origins of the horses is unknown.
