Tierschutzpartei on the environment and animal welfare

The Tierschutzpartei wants to permanently exempt dogs from shelters or certified animal welfare groups from the dog tax. Registration, microchipping, and liability insurance would become mandatory for all dogs. All owners would have to pass a nationwide test.

There should be no dog tax for dogs from animal shelters. All dogs should get a chip and be registered. Owners need insurance. All owners should take a test.

The tax exemption would last for the dog's entire life. The party sees no sensible reason for breeding dogs, especially for profit, because there are already more dogs than can be properly cared for. Official registration, mandatory liability insurance, and identification by microchip are meant to relieve shelters and animal welfare groups. In addition, there would be a nationwide dog owner license for the owners of all dogs.

The Tierschutzpartei wants to ban bottom trawling, strictly protect ten percent of marine areas and end offshore oil and gas extraction. In the long run it aims to end fishing; until then fleets should shrink and inspections increase.

The Tierschutzpartei wants to protect the seas better. Nets that drag along the sea floor should be banned. No one should drill for oil and gas at sea anymore. There should be fewer fishing boats.

By 2030, ten percent of the seas are to be designated wilderness areas free from human activity, in line with the EU Biodiversity Strategy. Destroyed habitats such as seagrass meadows, reefs and sandbanks are to be restored. Fishing inspections are to be tightened, for example with remote electronic monitoring and cameras. As long as fish are killed commercially, the platform demands fast, painless stunning instead of suffocation.

The Tierschutzpartei wants to protect and restore natural habitats such as forests, peatlands and river landscapes. Displaced native species are to be reintroduced, wolves and foxes protected, and pesticides that harm biodiversity gradually phased out.

The Tierschutzpartei wants to protect nature. Forests, peatlands and rivers should become more natural again. Animals that disappeared should come back. Wolves and foxes should be protected. Harmful pesticides should go away step by step.

The platform describes wolves and foxes as species that regulate ecosystems and relies on herd protection to ease conflicts with farming. Chemicals that harm biodiversity are to be phased out, while biological crop protection is to be researched and used more. Against light pollution, the party proposes LED lights with a high share of red, shielded lamps and switching off street lighting at night in little-used areas. Education projects are meant to convey the value of biodiversity.

The Tierschutzpartei wants to ban exports of plastic waste and reduce plastic packaging in retail. Composite packaging that is hard to recycle and plastic packaging without recycled content are to be banned immediately. It also supports a nationwide packaging tax.

The Tierschutzpartei wants less plastic waste. Germany should stop sending plastic waste abroad. Some kinds of packaging should be banned. There should be a tax on packaging. Stores that sell without packaging should get support.

The ban is to cover composite packaging that can barely or not at all be recycled, and plastic packaging not made at least partly from recycled material. Universities and state institutes are to receive money to develop packaging that is easier to recycle. For the packaging tax, the platform points to Tübingen, where the party says it led to less waste. Package-free stores are to be supported nationwide.

The Tierschutzpartei wants to ban large-scale logging and protect old-growth and primeval forests. Forestry is to become ecological and close to nature. Instead of conventional reforestation, the platform relies on forests regenerating on their own.

The Tierschutzpartei wants to protect forests. Cutting down large areas of forest should be banned. Old forests should stay. Forests should grow back by themselves. No pesticides or chemical fertilizer should be used in forests.

The platform cites studies saying natural regeneration is often more effective and ecologically valuable than artificial reforestation. In the party's view, non-native tree species and monocultures make forests more vulnerable to disease and climate impacts. Human intervention is therefore to be kept to a minimum. Pesticides and chemical fertilizers are no longer to be used in forests.

The Tierschutzpartei wants to significantly enlarge the area of nature reserves and prohibit construction, resource extraction and intensive farming there. A state fund is to pay for and coordinate projects that restore ecosystems.

The Tierschutzpartei wants more nature reserves. Nobody should build or mine there. Intensive farming should also be banned there. The state should set up a fund. The money should help restore damaged nature.

New reserves are to be created mainly in regions with high biodiversity. Visitor management and information campaigns are meant to allow recreation and education without harming the areas. Fallow land, rivers and other ecosystems are to be systematically restored, including natural watercourses and more greenery in cities. The projects are to provide targeted habitats for endangered species.

The Tierschutzpartei considers the current Animal Welfare Act incomplete and poorly enforced. It wants more staff for veterinary offices, specialized prosecutors, much tougher penalties and a right for animal welfare organizations to sue.

The Tierschutzpartei wants a stricter animal welfare law. Offices should check businesses more often and without warning. People who abuse animals should be punished harder. Animal welfare groups should be allowed to sue. Inspection reports should be public.

Veterinary offices are to inspect animal holdings, breeders, slaughterhouses and transports regularly and unannounced, using uniform procedures and a central digital inspection system. Specialized units at prosecutors' offices are to speed up cases. Fines are to rise sharply, especially for repeat offenders, and businesses with repeated or serious violations are to lose their permits. Independent bodies are to secure the inspections, and husbandry rules for farm animals, pets and wild animals are to become stricter. A central database is to record violations and publish inspection reports.

The Tierschutzpartei wants to completely ban the sale and use of fireworks by private individuals. It cites the suffering of wild animals and pets, environmental damage and dangers to people. Public low-noise fireworks displays are to remain allowed for a transition period.

The Tierschutzpartei wants to ban private fireworks. Nobody should buy or set off firecrackers anymore. The party says fireworks scare animals and harm the environment. Quiet public fireworks should still be allowed. Later, drone or laser shows should replace them.

The exception covers controlled, environmentally friendly and quiet public displays until drone or laser shows take their place. The platform also calls for more information campaigns. These are to educate the public about the effects of fireworks on animals, the environment and health.

The Tierschutzpartei wants to ban online sales of animals and the trade in wild animals. All pets would be registered and identified, and courses would be mandatory before getting one. The aim is to prevent poor care, abandonment and neglect.

Nobody would be allowed to sell animals online. Every pet would be registered and marked. People would take a course before getting a pet. This should mean fewer abandoned animals.

So-called petfluencers, who earn money by showing animals, would also fall under the ban. Trade in exotic wild animals would end completely because, according to the platform, keeping them harms the animals and endangers public safety. Abuse would bring much higher fines and neglect would have criminal consequences. Low-income owners would get help with basic veterinary care for their pets. Campaigns would promote adoption from shelters.

The Tierschutzpartei calls for a nationwide duty to neuter and identify free-roaming cats. Stray cats, city pigeons and other homeless animals would be cared for with public money.

Cats that roam freely would have to be neutered. This would be the rule in all of Germany. That way there are fewer stray cats. The state would also pay for city pigeons and homeless animals.

Animal welfare groups or municipalities would run supervised feeding stations for stray cats. Rescue programs and foster homes for homeless animals would receive public funds, and authorities and shelters would cooperate more closely. Pigeon protection groups would get state funding, including for supervised pigeon lofts and research. A crisis fund for rescuing animals is planned for emergencies such as natural disasters or epidemics.

The Tierschutzpartei wants to secure permanent funding for animal shelters and introduce national quality standards for them. A state fund would pay for treating animals from shelters and low-income households. Incentives would ensure enough veterinary practices in rural areas.

Animal shelters would get lasting money from the state. The same rules would apply to all shelters. A fund would pay the vet for poor pet owners. There should be enough vets in the countryside too.

Binding national standards would ensure proper housing in shelters. National platforms would make adoption easier, and campaigns would discourage buying from uncontrolled breeders. Training for veterinary staff would improve, and specialization in animal welfare medicine would get more support. Practices would be required to use modern, gentle procedures.

The Tierschutzpartei wants to abolish hunting as a pastime and, in the long run, end all hunting. It would be replaced by science-based wildlife management without killing. The platform considers hunting ethically and ecologically indefensible.

The Tierschutzpartei wants to ban hunting as a hobby. Later there would be no hunting at all. Experts would manage wild animal numbers in other ways. No animal should die in the process.

Driven hunts, den hunting, trapping, capture pens, kill traps and shotgun pellets would be banned right away. Training facilities where hunting dogs are set on foxes would also be closed. The platform criticizes that hunters never have to prove their marksmanship again after getting a license. It holds that every animal has a right to life and physical integrity.

The Tierschutzpartei wants to ban the shooting of protected species such as wolves and beavers without exception. Habitats would be preserved through stricter rules for construction and clearing and through wildlife corridors. Poaching would be punished more severely.

Nobody would be allowed to hunt wolves, beavers or birds of prey. The state would stop the shooting of wolves at once. Wild animals would get safe routes to roam. People who hunt illegally would face tougher penalties.

A central monitoring system would track populations, and protection programs would help endangered species. A legal duty to rescue wild animals in traffic accidents and during harvest is planned. Robotic lawn mowers would not be allowed to run at night. Fences and livestock guardian dogs would get more funding; without effective herd protection, farmers would no longer be compensated for livestock killed by predators. Germany would cooperate more closely with other countries against the illegal wildlife trade.

The Tierschutzpartei demands a complete ban on animal testing in all fields and wants to write it into the Basic Law, Germany's constitution. Importing and selling products tested on animals would also be prohibited. The platform considers animal experiments ethically indefensible and scientifically questionable.

The Tierschutzpartei wants to ban all experiments on animals. The ban would be written into the constitution. Products tested on animals could no longer be sold. The party says there are better methods without animals.

The ban would cover everything from basic research, medicine, pharmaceuticals and cosmetics to weapons and space research. Exceptions in German and European law would be removed. The import and sales ban would apply to goods from inside the EU as well as from outside. According to the platform, results from animal experiments can only be transferred to humans to a limited extent.

The Tierschutzpartei wants to put far more money into research methods without animals and withdraw all public funding from research on animals. A neutral agency would oversee the transition. On the committees that decide on experiment applications, animal welfare and science would have equal representation.

Research without animals would get much more money. Experiments on animals would get no more state money. A new agency would check everything. Animal advocates would have the same say as researchers on applications.

New research centers would develop and validate animal-free test methods, and innovation competitions would speed up development. Existing alternatives would become mandatory, and the EU would harmonize their approval without extra validation through animal experiments. Reports on animal experiments, including the burden on animals and the results, would be published, and labs would face unannounced inspections. Committee members could not work professionally in animal testing. The OECD and WHO would be more involved in global standards.

The Tierschutzpartei wants to limit live animal transport to a maximum of two hours immediately and ban exports to non-EU countries without adequate animal welfare. In the long term, long-distance exports would end entirely. The platform cites the animals' suffering from heat, cold, crowding, hunger and thirst.

Animals would be transported for two hours at most. Germany would not send live animals to countries without animal protection. Cameras would watch the transports. Later there would be no long transports at all.

GPS tracking and video recording would monitor every transport throughout, with more staff for inspections. No transports would take place when forecasts are above 25 °C or below 5 °C. Heavily pregnant animals, calves under 12 weeks and pigs under 30 days would not be transported. German and EU public money for live animal transport would end. Violations would bring higher fines and, if repeated, loss of the operating license.

The Tierschutzpartei wants to ban animals in circuses and shows entirely because, in its view, they cannot be kept appropriately there. Zoos and aquariums without an essential role in species conservation would close in the long term.

There would be no more animals in circuses and shows. The party says animals cannot live well there. Many zoos would close later. Only zoos that protect endangered species would stay.

Transition rules that let animals be displayed until the end of their lives would be dropped without replacement. Cameras in circuses and similar businesses would document how animals are treated. Closed zoos would be replaced by virtual offerings, educational platforms and exhibitions. Bullfights, rodeos and foie gras production would be outlawed worldwide. Films and ads would not be allowed to show animals in suffering or unnatural situations.

The Tierschutzpartei wants to regulate animal breeding strictly and ban Qualzucht (breeding that causes suffering) without exception. This means breeding for looks in ways that damage the animals' health. Crosses between wild and domestic animals and imports of bred animals would also be stopped.

Some animals are bred in ways that make them sick. The Tierschutzpartei wants to ban this completely. Nobody would be allowed to breed mixes of wolf and dog. Bred animals from other countries could not be brought in.

Animals with such harmful traits could not be exhibited or used in advertising. Existing breeding operations would be monitored much more closely. The platform sees hybrid breeds such as wolf-dog crosses as a risk to animals and people, while naturally occurring hybrids would be protected. Import and trade of bred animals would end, especially from countries with low animal welfare standards.

The Tierschutzpartei wants to permanently close fur farms in Germany and generally ban breeding animals for fur. Fur from countries with fur farms could be neither imported nor traded. The platform cites animal suffering, environmental damage from chemicals and the availability of animal-free alternatives.

The Tierschutzpartei wants to close all fur farms. Nobody would be allowed to breed animals for fur. Fur from countries with fur farms could no longer be sold. The party says the animals suffer greatly.

The import and trade ban is meant to reduce demand for fur. Real fur could not be passed off as fake fur, and terms such as animal-friendly or sustainable would be prohibited for fur goods. Information campaigns would explain killing methods and the environmental effects of fur consumption.