Assessing the welfare level of intensive fattening pig farms in Germany with the Welfare Quality® protocol: does farm size matter?

Meyer-Hamme, S. E. K.; Lambertz, Christian; Gauly, Matthias

doi:10.7120/09627286.27.3.275

Cited by 6 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 36 publications

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“…According to the WQ ® protocol, growers and fatteners in Slovenian conventional farms were rated as acceptable, while Slovenian alternative farms were rated as enhanced. In Germany, the welfare of fattening pigs on conventional farms was assessed and, regardless of farm size, the overall WQ classifications 'excellent' and 'not classified' were not recorded in any of the farms, while 'enhanced' and 'acceptable' were achieved by 80 and 20 % of the farms, respectively (Meyer-Hamme et al, 2018).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Animal welfare assessment in Slovenian conventional and alternative pig production systems

2021

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The aims of the study were to assess the welfare of pigs in Slovenian farms based on the international Welfare Quality? Assessment protocol for pigs and to gain a first insight into the welfare of pigs in Slovenian conventional and alternative farms. Pig welfare in Slovenia was assessed using the Welfare Quality? protocol on 10 alternative and 10 conventional farms. The size of the farm ranged from 11 to 1900 breeding sows in conventional farms and from three to 50 breeding sows in alternative farms. Using the protocol, the welfare of breeding sows, suckling piglets, growers, and fattening pigs was evaluated. The protocol consisted of four main principles of animal welfare (good feeding, good housing, good health, and appropriate behaviour), which were subdivided into 12 independent criteria. To evaluate each of these criteria, a set of measures was used. Overall animal welfare quality was calculated with a mathematical model incorporated into the protocol. Depending on the scores of the four principles, farms were classified as excellent, enhanced, acceptable or not classified. According to the Welfare Quality? protocol and statistical calculation, growers and fatteners in Slovenian conventional farms were rated as acceptable, while Slovenian alternative farms were rated as enhanced. We can conclude that the welfare of the growers and fatteners in our alternative farms is at a higher level than in conventional farms. The most critical evaluation points in sows were bursitis, wounds on the body, stereotypies, and fear of humans.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Animal welfare assessment in Slovenian conventional and alternative pig production systems

2021

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“…It is noteworthy that water supply has also emerged as an important animal welfare issue in other protocols and species (e.g. Meyer-Hamme et al 2018 ; Otten et al 2020 )…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…It is noteworthy that water supply has also emerged as an important animal welfare issue in other protocols and species (e.g. Meyer-Hamme et al 2018;Otten et al 2020) The measure 'Cooling system' was identified as an area of concern for weaner-to-finisher pigs. To comply with current Danish legislation, a means of cooling must be available for all pigs above 20 kg (Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Fisheries 2020).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Identifying areas of animal welfare concern in different production stages in Danish pig herds using the Danish Animal Welfare Index (DAWIN)

et al. 2023

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Animal welfare is of increasing public interest, and the pig industry in particular is subject to much attention. The aim of this study was to identify and compare areas of animal welfare concern for commercial pigs in four different production stages: (1) gestating sows and gilts; (2) lactating sows; (3) piglets; and (4) weaner-to-finisher pigs. One welfare assessment protocol was developed for each stage, comprising of between 20 and 29 animal welfare measures including resource-, management- and animal-based ones. Twenty-one Danish farms were visited once between January 2015 and February 2016 in a cross-sectional design. Experts (n = 26; advisors, scientists and animal welfare controllers) assessed the severity of the outcome measures. This was combined with the on-farm prevalence of each measure and the outcome was used to calculate areas of concern, defined as measures where the median of all farms fell below the value defined as ‘acceptable welfare.’ Between five and seven areas of concern were identified for each production stage. With the exception of carpal lesions in piglets, all areas of concern were resource- and management-based and mainly related to housing, with inadequate available space and the floor type in the resting area being overall concerns across all production stages. This means that animal-based measures were largely unaffected by perceived deficits in resource-based measures. Great variation existed for the majority of measures identified as areas of concern, demonstrating that achieving a high welfare score is possible in the Danish system.

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“…In conventional farming systems, multiple factors, including environmental factors [ 20 , 31 ], lead to soiled bodies. e.g., seasonal effects, cleanliness of the pen and the type of flooring [ 14 ]. Temple et al [ 20 ] also found that moderately soiled body measurements appeared to be sensitive to differences between intensive farming systems.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…There are many studies on the correlation between the results of animal-based parameters and environment-based parameters. In particular, the most important environmental determinants of pig welfare were space allowance and bedding material [ 14 ]. However, improving farm animal welfare mainly based on these two variables is difficult to achieve because most pig farms in intensive livestock production system use concrete or metal slatted floors that does not allow bedding materials to be used.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Correlation of animal-based parameters with environment-based parameters in an on-farm welfare assessment of growing pigs

Kang¹,

Bae²,

Lee³

2022

J Anim Sci Technol

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Nine pig farms were evaluated for the welfare quality in Korea using animal- and environment-based parameters (particularly air quality parameters) during the winter of 2013. The Welfare Quality ® (WQ ® ) protocol consists of 12 criteria within four principles. The WQ ® protocol classifies farms into four categories ranging from ‘excellent’ to ‘not classified’. Each of these criteria has specific measures for calculating scores. Calculations for the welfare scores were conducted online using the calculation model in the WQ ® protocol. Environment-based parameters like microclimate (i.e., temperature, relative humidity, air speed, and particulate matter), bacteria (total airborne bacteria, airborne total coliform, and airborne total Escherichia coli ), concentration of gases (carbon dioxide, ammonia, and hydrogen sulfide) were measured to investigate the relationship between animal- and environment-based parameters. Correlations between the results of animal- and environment-based parameters were estimated using spearman correlation coefficient. The overall assessments found that five out of nine farms were ‘acceptable’, and four farms were ‘enhanced’; no farm was ‘not classified’. The average score for the four principles across the nine farms, in decreasing order, were ‘good feeding’ (63.13 points) > ‘good housing’ (59.26 points) > ‘good health’ (33.47 points) > ‘appropriate behaviors’ (25.48 points). In the result of the environment aspect, the relative humidity of farms 2 (93.4%), 3 (100%), and 9 (98%) was much higher than the recommended maximum relative humidity of 80%, and four out of the nine farms had ammonia concentrations greater than 40 ppm. Ammonia had negative correlations with ‘positive social behaviors’ and positive emotional states: content, enjoying, sociable, playful, lively, happy and it had positive correlations with negative emotional states: aimless, distressed. The concentration of carbon dioxide had negative correlations with positive emotional states; calm, sociable, playful, happy and it had a positive correlation with negative emotional state; aimless. Our results indicate that the control of the environment for growing pigs can help improve their welfare, particularly via good air quality (carbon dioxide, ammonia, hydrogen sulfide).

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Assessing the welfare level of intensive fattening pig farms in Germany with the Welfare Quality® protocol: does farm size matter?

Cited by 6 publications

References 36 publications

Animal welfare assessment in Slovenian conventional and alternative pig production systems

Animal welfare assessment in Slovenian conventional and alternative pig production systems

Identifying areas of animal welfare concern in different production stages in Danish pig herds using the Danish Animal Welfare Index (DAWIN)

Correlation of animal-based parameters with environment-based parameters in an on-farm welfare assessment of growing pigs

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