On 31st December 2025, Ohio became the 11th US state to restrict the use of gestation crates for breeding sows, closing a 15‑year chapter of campaigning and negotiation between animal advocates and the state’s powerful agribusiness sector. The new rules curb the extreme confinement of gestating pigs in metal cages so small they cannot turn around or fully stretch their limbs. However, farrowing cages, which are very similar and are used for mother pigs after having given birth, will still be allowed.
The change implements the final element of an eight‑point animal welfare agreement struck in 2010 between advocates led by Ohioans for Humane Farms and key industry bodies such as the Ohio Farm Bureau Federation, the Ohio Pork Producers’ Council, and the Ohio Poultry Association. Campaigners had gathered more than 650,000 signatures for a ballot initiative to prohibit the extreme confinement of sows, veal calves, and laying hens, but accepted a negotiated 15‑year phase‑out of gestation crates, alongside a faster end to veal crates and a halt to new battery cage construction.
Other measures bundled into the deal included felony penalties for cockfighting, tougher standards for large‑scale dog breeders, a ban on dragging and slaughtering “downer” cows, and a prohibition on private ownership of dangerous wild animals, most of which were eventually enacted after some legislative delays. The clause on dangerous carnivores only materialised in law after the notorious Zanesville incident, when a private owner released dozens of large predators into the community before taking his own life, prompting police to kill the animals on the streets in front of shocked residents and a global audience.
Wayne Pacelle, president of Animal Wellness Action and the Center for a Humane Economy, said, “This moment has been a long time coming…Immobilising a breed sow for as long as three years in a crate barely larger the animal’s body is inhumane at its core.” Reformist measures like this often have a much lower impact on the animals’ lives than animal protection campaigners expect, not only because they are often not enforced, as happened in California with Proposition 12, but because the animals continue to be kept captive in terrible conditions, continue to be caged, and continue to be killed while still young. Only a total transition to a plant-based food system and the application of vegan-friendly policies can solve this problem.
