Animal welfare is the animal’s experience or feelings, on a continuum from poor to good. Measurement of resources describes the risks for poor or the opportunities for good welfare. Animal-based measures provide a greater insight into the animal’s mental state. However, important aspects of animal welfare are not well-captured in existing welfare assessment. Use of sensors may improve our ability to assess some aspects of welfare in the future.
Farm animal welfare is assessed for compliance with legislation and labelling schemes, to evaluate the impacts of management change and for animal welfare research. Here we ask: how we can assess how the animal experiences its life on farm?
Animal welfare is what the animal experiences and spans very negative to very positive emotional states. Welfare is influenced by nutrition, the environment, health and the behavioural interactions that animals have, integrated through the impacts that these have on the mental state of the animal.
Whilst we can often readily measure and describe the conditions under which the animal is housed on farm (inputs), and the physical state of the animal within these conditions, these are not sufficient to tells us what the animal is experiencing.
The Gold Standard for animal welfare, therefore, would be a measure that tells us something about the mental state of the animal. Currently, this is not considered a directly measurable entity, and it may remain a hypothetical rather than a realistic construct in welfare assessment.
Thus, welfare assessment relies on a series of measurable outputs, or indicators, that serve as proxies for welfare state. Emotional state, and welfare, is then inferred from these measures. Animal-based measures are considered the most relevant to understanding animal experience, although these require rigorous assessment of the validity and reliability of measurement.
Many animal-based measures rely on assessment of behaviour. These may be ongoing changes in response, such as approach or avoidance, facial expression, Qualitative Behaviour Assessment and circadian rhythms or complex patterns of behaviour, such as preferences, motivational priorities, or perceptions, which allow deeper insight into the likely mental state of the animal.
Many measures are only suitable for research purposes at present and can be challenging to assess on farm, but some may be amenable to use of sensors or automated methods in the future. These have technological and ethical challenges to overcome and require an understanding of what is being measured and how this relates to the animal’s mental state but may offer opportunities for continual assessment of animal behaviour and welfare in the future.
Currently, however, theoretical understanding of animal welfare, particularly positive welfare and cumulative ‘Quality of Life’, is not well-captured in existing on farm welfare assessment. We conclude that there is a need for a more comprehensive and integrated approach to the development of methods which can truly address the animal’s experience on farm.
Source: Animal Journal