Campaign group launch protest in Harrogate over 'sheep cruelty' during week of Great Yorkshire Show

The striking billboard, which covers one whole end of a house on Butler Road, is the work of PETA, the international non-profit charitable organization dedicated to the protection of animals worldwide.

A campaign group committed to the ethical treatment of animals, PETA say the huge poster – located in the Bilton area of Harrogate just minutes away from the Great Yorkshire Showground – is part of a campaign urging farmers to ditch what they claim is “cruel, environmentally disastrous sheep farming” for arable, vegan methods.

PETA Vice President of Corporate Projects Dawn Carr said: ““Everyone needs farmers, but farmers don’t need to exploit animals and interfere with their bodies – for wool, meat, or milk.

"This is why we are encouraging them to hang up their shears and leave the heartbreak and violence of sheep farming behind.”

The striking billboard will be ‘live’ in Harrogate for the entire week of the Great Yorkshire Show.

The campaign group says it chose the town for the protest partly because the Great Yorkshire Show hosts parades and shearing competitions that, in its view “exploits gentle, non-consenting animals.”

Last year, PETA up announced the winners of its first-ever Farming Awards as part of its battle to change the nature of rural agriculture..

PETA has also shared exposés of 117 wool-industry operations around the world – including in the UK – where workers have been documented kicking, punching, and slitting the throats of conscious, struggling sheep.

Raising sheep for wool also negatively impacts the environment.

As ruminant animals, sheep produce large amounts of methane, a planet-warming greenhouse gas.

For more information, visit: https://www.peta.org.uk/