Giulia Innocenzi, her mission against intensive farming and a bomb documentary on the way

Our interview with journalist Giulia Innocenzi after her latest investigation into intensive farming aired on Report.

• Intensive farming is a production system perpetrated to the detriment of human, animal and environmental health.
• For several years Giulia Innocenzi has been telling all this, interpreting her work as a mission to make things change.
• After the investigation between China and Italy aired on Report, the journalist announces a European documentary that will cause a lot of talk.

Giulia Innocenzi, born in '84, is a well-known Italian journalist, author of books and television investigations.In recent years he has concentrated his professional efforts on documenting the problems and scandals of intensive farming.His latest investigation aired on Reports last November 5th and on Instagram channel of the Rai3 broadcast passed the million and a half views (1,7). 

A journey between China And Italy who, between unforeseen events, strokes of luck and cover-ups, managed to show the giant skyscraper pig farms that arose in the People's Republic of China after the epidemic African swine fever and to tell - with the help of the images of the animal rights association Last Chance for Animals - the farms in Lombardy grappling with the same virus, among culls not at all ethical and safe for animals and public funding which continue to fuel this unsustainable system from an environmental, animal welfare and human health point of view.

We contacted her to find out more about the investigation, but also about her commitment to these issues.Here is the interview.

You decided to leave for China last spring, after reading the news about a 26-story skyscraper used as a pig farm.Once on site, what did you discover compared to the information that had been circulating?
The aspect that shocked me the most was the conditions of the workers who live with their families in a sort of city inside the farms to avoid the circulation of viruses and the risk of contagion:only their children can go out to go to school, while they only have four days off a month and every time they return they have to undergo quarantine and swab tests, take three showers and wash their clothes at 70 degrees.They told us about swimming pools and gyms, but what we saw were actually dilapidated houses.The workers accept this compromise because the salaries are a little higher than average and because these are remote areas.

What we then understood was that many of these giant skyscraper farms are being built throughout China, but the most disturbing thing we discovered was that European delegations from Holland and Spain went to visit these farms.And they certainly didn't do it for tourist reasons.

When faced with certain scenes or experiencing certain situations that offend your sensitivity, always remain impassive and professional.What do you actually feel?
The goal in these cases is to get my interlocutor to talk as much as possible, so I try to accommodate him as much as possible.And I do everything to make the cover work.Just think that after the visit to the maxi farm 100 kilometers from Wuhan, where we managed to enter because I pretended to be the daughter of an Italian breeder who wanted to export this system, the director invited us to lunch and there, despite not consuming meat from ten years, I had to eat a bite of farm-raised pork and they even forced me to do an encore!

In the investigation you drew a parallel between China and Italy which are united by certain situations, while in other aspects they travel at different speeds.In response to the problems generated by intensive farming and meat consumption, what are the global solutions?
The obvious link between China and Italy is that China decided to focus on these giant skyscraper farms after African swine fever killed 200 million pigs in the country in 2018 and that Italy is now grappling with the same viral disease among the pigs.

What we are doing against swine fever, in addition to culling more than 40 thousand pigs, is reimbursing the farmers in full, without making any reflection on the fact that intensive farming is a risk to human health.This is not the case with African swine fever, but as regards avian influenza, for example, the virus has already made the leap from species from chickens to humans and there are only a few steps left for it to be transmitted from human to human.

While scientists tell us that intensive farming is a time bomb as far as future pandemics are concerned, we continue to go in the opposite direction - and also opposite to what the excellence of Made in Italy should be - and to open new productions of this type.This is shocking to me.

The second reflection is that the Chinese currently eat less meat than us, but consumption is increasing because they want to imitate the Western diet.This is a problem for all of us and for the Planet, but we cannot ask the Chinese to reduce their meat consumption if we don't do it first because we are the ones who are eating the most and who have consumed meat up to now.We should therefore try to set a good example for the rest of the world to change things.

Launching your investigation on social media, in the post you wrote: “PFor the pig, whether it is on the 26th floor or on the ground floor, nothing changes:he will spend his miserable life locked up in a pen or cage, and then he will go to the slaughterhouse... Continuing to exploit animals as if they were inanimate objects in our service will come back to us, be it with the next pandemic or with climate change”.Which of the two things worries you more?
Climate change.We are seeing it, it is there for all to see, any weather event is creating problems for us and it is just the beginning.Yet we continue to pollute more and more and I don't understand how we can be so obtuse, so dissociated from the consequences of our actions.

This is also why it is important for me to show even the crudest images, even if some viewers change the channel.I discussed this with Sigfrido Ranucci (journalist and presenter of Report, ed) and he replied that this is our job and that as public service journalists we have the duty to show everything.

The absurd thing is that after these images the Regional Council of Lombardy, on the subject of African swine fever, did not discuss the mistreatment to which the animals were subjected during the slaughter, nor the biosafety procedures not respected, but there was talk of how to give refreshments to farmers as soon as possible.For me it's shocking:we are blind to the problem, we don't want to see it, but this thing will come back to us and present us with a very high bill.

You have been dealing with these issues for several years now, can we say that it has become your mission?
Yes, for me it's a mission.I am lucky enough to be able to talk about these things to many people through a powerful medium like television.I feel this responsibility and I want to make the best use of it.I chose to talk about these issues because they are among the least addressed of all and, instead, they need to be known by citizens, institutions and breeders themselves:some of them thank me because they want to change this system in which they don't recognize themselves but which they have had to adapt to in order not to stay out of the market.

In the many years that you have been following these topics, has anything improved?
People are certainly more aware than they were ten years ago;the problem is that this awareness of citizens does not correspond to the actions of politicians who continue to support the lobbies of farmers, meat producers and big brands who are very powerful throughout Europe.

The European Union it should have adopted more stringent laws for animal welfare, for example by eliminating cages on sow farms that do not allow the animals to turn the other way, but only to get up and down, also risking injury;instead, the Commission withdrew the reform package at the insistence of lobbies.We will now talk about it again in the next Commission after the European elections and this is scandalous.We continue to tell ourselves that Europe is the leading continent for respect for animal welfare, but we are not proving it.

What tools do we have, in addition to communicative ones, to generate awareness and change things?
A label that tells you whether the meat you are buying comes from intensive or extensive farming would be useful.It is thought that in this way people could buy less and more quality meat given that the latest Eurispes survey says that 75 percent of Italians are against intensive farming.

The consumer today, however, does not have this right because any proposal made on the topic - such as the reform package that we presented to the Chamber of Deputies a few years ago - is rejected because over 90 percent of the products present in the supermarket come from intensive production .

What do you think about cultured meat?
I was in Singapore and tried cultured chicken meat:I found it good, very similar to farmed meat.I think it is one of the solutions on the table to reduce the problems of intensive farming:we don't kill animals, we don't have the same pollution, we don't risk the spread of viruses.So why ban it when there is no industrial production yet and it is not yet authorized in the European Union?

On this, the Italian government, with the bill on synthetic food, waged an ideological battle in favor of the farmers' lobbies:electorally he certainly achieved his goals, but as far as problem solving is concerned he failed.In any case, if the law were approved, the European Union would reject it because the marketing of products cannot be prevented if they are authorized in the EU.

What projects are you working on now?
For five years I have been carrying out the creation of a European documentary on these themes:It's a project that I care a lot about because I put my heart and soul into it together with many people who helped me deal with so many problems.It will be released early next year, but I can't say more because we have to resolve some legal issues first.Being a controversial documentary, I'm struggling to find distribution partners and we'll have to roll up our sleeves on this one too, but I'm sure we'll be able to show it to a lot of people.I can't wait for it to come out because it's going to be a bit of a mess.