As Special Agent 007, Sir Roger Moore battled the bad guys in Live and Let Die, A View to a Kill, Octopussy, The Spy Who Loved Me and The Man With the Golden Gun. As a real-life Knight of the British Empire and enemy of those who are cruel to animals, he is now battling foie gras.

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Moore has teamed up with PETA by narrating a video in which he points out that foie gras is a disease, not a delicacy.

Why is Moore crying “fowl” over foie gras? Ducks and geese raised for foie gras are abused in ways that would be illegal if dogs and cats were the victims. Foie gras (French for “fatty liver”) is produced by cramming metal pipes down the throats of ducks and geese and force-feeding them until their livers become painfully diseased and enlarged and, in some cases, their organs rupture.

Investigations into foie gras farms in Europe and the United States have all revealed the same thing – sick, dead and dying animals, some with holes in their necks from pipe injuries. An Animal Protection & Rescue League investigation found one farm where ducks with bloody beaks and their wings twisted together were jammed into wire cages. At another farm, birds were dangling by wires as blood spilled from wounds in their necks and onto the live birds beneath them. After being subjected to this constant torture for about a month, ducks and geese are shackled upside-down, and their throats are cut.

As if this isn't awful enough, animals used in foie gras production may also be live-plucked for down. In countries where this cruel practice continues, up to 5 ounces of feathers and down are pulled from each bird every six weeks from the time they are 10 weeks old until they are up to 4 years old. Plucking geese causes them considerable pain and distress. One study of chickens' heart rates and behaviours determined that "feather removal is likely to be painful to the bird(s)", and another study found that the blood glucose level of some geese nearly doubled (a symptom of severe stress) during plucking.

Foie gras farms are so cruel that force-feeding birds has been prohibited in many countries, including Israel, Switzerland and the UK. In 2004, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed a bill outlawing both the production and the sale of foie gras in California. Many restaurants, however, still serve this cruel product.

Learn more about foie gras.

What You Can Do
Join Sir Roger Moore, PETA and caring people around the world by never purchasing foie gras.

Foie gras is so vile that its production has already been ended in 15 countries, including here in the UK. Even though its production is prohibited by UK animal welfare standards, there is no specific ban in place in UK law against force-feeding. Furthermore, although it violates UK animal welfare standards, foie gras is still imported into the UK and sold in shops and restaurants.

France produces almost 80 per cent of the world’s foie gras, and its output has doubled since 1990. France is the leading exporter of foie gras into the UK, which means British restaurants and stores pay French producers to abuse ducks and geese for them. PETA Europe is calling for a complete ban on the production of foie gras within the European Union. We are also asking the UK government to strengthen the prohibition against foie gras production as allowed under our welfare laws by enacting a specific law to ban force-feeding in the UK. Lastly, we are asking for a ban on all importation of the product into the UK.

Please help us get this barbaric form of torture off menus and shelves in the UK!

• Click here to sign the petition (it only takes a few seconds) calling on Prime Minister Tony Blair to place before Parliament a bill to prohibit the sale of foie gras in shops and restaurants.
• Write to Ben Bradshaw, MP, Minister of State (Local Environment, Marine and Animal Welfare), and ask him to introduce a legal ban on the production of foie gras in the UK. Request that he ban foie gras imports to the UK for this violation of our animal welfare regulations and that the UK government push for a total ban on foie gras production across Europe:
  
  The Rt Hon. Ben Bradshaw, MP
  Minister of State (Local Environment, Marine and Animal Welfare)
  DEFRA
  Nobel House
  17 Smith Square
  London SW1P 3JR
• Demand a complete ban on force-feeding and the use of birds for foie gras production in the European Union by writing to:
  
  Commissioner Mariann Fischer Boel
  Commissioner for Agriculture
  European Commission
  B-1049 Brussels
  Belgium
  
  Commissioner Markos Kyprianou
  European Commission for Health and Consumer Protection
  Commission of the European Union
  200 Rue de le Loi
  1049 Brussels
  Belgium
• Speak up! If you see foie gras on a restaurant menu or for sale in a shop, please have a word with the manager or event organiser and politely explain why foie gras shouldn’t be sold. Ask that it be removed from the menu or the shelves.
• Urge your MP to sign EDM 1247, which calls upon the government to prohibit the sale of foie gras in the UK. Find your MP here.