Icahn takes pig-welfare push global amid McDonald’s proxy fight

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Carl Icahn is broadening a push to get McDonald’s Corp (MCD.N) to improve suppliers’ treatment of pigs raised for bacon and sausage

 
by  Tom Polansek – Reuters

The billionaire activist investor, who has described himself as an animal lover, on Thursday called on the burger chain to make a global pledge to eliminate the use of metal enclosures to house pregnant pigs. He has said the enclosures, known as gestation crates, are “obscene” and cause pigs unnecessary pain.

“Perhaps if McDonald’s leaders applied the same efforts they do towards obtaining better compensation packages for themselves to getting their suppliers to become completely gestation crate free, we wouldn’t be having this proxy fight
 
 

McDonald’s last month said it would remove gestation crates from its U.S. supply chain by 2024, pushing back a 10-year goal it set in 2012 with Icahn’s urging.

Pork producers use the crates, which are about 7 feet (2.1 m) long and 2 feet wide, to confine mother pigs with no room to turn around.

Icahn said he also wants McDonald’s to commit to buying pork from suppliers that abide by standards set in a California animal-welfare law, Proposition 12. Approved by California voters in November 2018, the measure prohibits confining a breeding pig with less than 24 square feet of usable floor space.

McDonald’s had no immediate comment on Icahn’s call for a global commitment or on his demand that the company buy only from suppliers that comply with Proposition 12.

Icahn nominated two members to McDonald’s board of directors in an escalating fight over the treatment of pigs by suppliers.

“Perhaps if McDonald’s leaders applied the same efforts they do towards obtaining better compensation packages for themselves to getting their suppliers to become completely gestation crate free, we wouldn’t be having this proxy fight,” Icahn said.

 
 
 

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