AN ethical supermarket has criticised vegan activists for spreading “twisted misinformation” about its business.

Animal activist group Sussex Animal Save has splashed an image of a bloodied pig across social media, claiming Hisbe, in Brighton, gets its meat from “unethical” farms.

The activists said they saw the injured animal being transported in a trailer heading from a farm to Tottingworth abattoir in Heathfield. They say Hisbe gets its meat from there.

But the owners of the sustainable supermarket said the activists’ information was incorrect and the pig was nothing to do with them.

Ruth Anslow, co-founder of Hisbe said the team responded to the image online with a statement, detailing the correct facts about where and how the shop sources its meat but it was swiftly deleted by the activists.

She said: “All the meat we sell is traceable back to a handful of very small-scale farmers.

“They take the animals raised on their farm to the abattoir and then the animals are returned to the farmer and the meat is butchered and packed to sell in our shop. Our pork products come from pigs raised on a farm in Mayfield, and our pig farmer has not transported pigs to Tottingworth or anywhere else today. We have no idea where that pig was from, which farm it came from or how it injured its ear.”

Ms Anslow said extremists groups such as Sussex Animal Save and DxE Brighton are attacking small businesses like Hisbe, which is working hard to fight factory farmed food, because if they “made up information about bigger supermarkets, they would be sued and exposed publicly”.

She said: “They are not interested in reporting the facts of what we do and don’t do, they just make up whatever they like about us, twist our messaging and make out they are quoting us.

“We are passionately against factory farming and live exports. We advocate for the Compassion In World Farming’s campaigns on these subjects.

“We would love to see these extreme groups put their energy and passion into supporting positive campaigns like these, instead of spreading sensationalised misinformation about what we do.”

Steven Lowmax, a veterinary surgeon for the Trade Association, who also works at Tottingworth abattoir, said the pig’s injury was nothing to do with them or Hisbe.

He said: “The original farmer will have tagged this animal, because that is the law, if you own a pig, and they may have burst a blood vessel in this process.

“The animals barely feel anything when they are tagged. This has not been a result of maltreatment, and it’s certainly not a factory-farmed animal.”