Protecting animals across the globe

Legal scholar Charlotte Blattner of the University of Bern receives the 2020 Marie Heim-Vögtlin Prize. SNF/Cornelia Vincentian - This year, the Swiss National Science Foundation's Marie Heim-Vögtlin Prize has been awarded to researcher Charlotte Blattner, whose dissertation on animal rights shows how animals can be protected across national borders. Every year billions of male chicks are shredded worldwide. The chicks can neither be fattened for slaughter nor used any other way in the animal industry and therefore are considered expendable. The public is largely opposed to this practice, and in some places it is even unconstitutional. However, higher standards are often not introduced because the industry can simply move abroad, thus avoiding domestic animal welfare safeguards. Most areas in which animals are used, such as agriculture and medical research, are globalised.