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The “Real Welfare” Scheme: Changes in UK Finishing Pig Welfare since the Introduction of Formal Welfare Outcome Assessment

SIMPLE SUMMARY: Farm animal welfare is an important issue for both farmers and the general public. In order to monitor animal welfare on a large population of finishing pig farms in the UK, the “Real Welfare” project developed a methodology for on-farm assessment based on regular measurement of some...

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Autores principales: Pandolfi, Fanny, Barber, Claire, Edwards, Sandra
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8909812/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35268177
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ani12050607
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author Pandolfi, Fanny
Barber, Claire
Edwards, Sandra
author_facet Pandolfi, Fanny
Barber, Claire
Edwards, Sandra
author_sort Pandolfi, Fanny
collection PubMed
description SIMPLE SUMMARY: Farm animal welfare is an important issue for both farmers and the general public. In order to monitor animal welfare on a large population of finishing pig farms in the UK, the “Real Welfare” project developed a methodology for on-farm assessment based on regular measurement of some key animal-based measures, so-called welfare outcomes. This paper presents estimates of the percentage of these different welfare outcomes over the years since the inception of the scheme. Between 2016 and 2019, the mean percentage of pigs in the mainstream herd showing four mandatory welfare outcomes (pigs requiring hospitalization, lame pigs, pigs with severe tail lesions, and pigs with severe body marks) was very low and a decreasing trend was observed for all outcomes except severe tail lesions. These data give good representation of the overall situation in the UK finishing pig population. ABSTRACT: Farm animal welfare is an increasingly important issue, leading to the need for an efficient methodology to deliver accurate benchmarking. The “Real Welfare” project developed a methodology based on regular recording of a limited number of animal-based measures, so-called welfare outcomes, which allows faster and easier on-farm assessment of finishing pig welfare. The objective of this paper is to estimate, with sufficient robustness and confidence, the prevalence of different mandatory and optional welfare outcomes in the mainstream herd of the finishing farms in the UK based on the “Real Welfare” scheme data and to assess the changes in prevalence over time, inspection visits and seasons. The mean overall prevalence of the four mandatory welfare outcomes (pigs requiring hospitalization, lame pigs, pigs with severe body marks, and pigs with severe tail lesions) was very low (≤0.2%) and a significant decreasing trend was observed for the first three of these mandatory welfare outcomes since the inception of the scheme. This result might reflect either a reduction in factors giving rise to welfare problems in the mainstream herd or increasing awareness about management of compromised pigs. Additional data are required to clarify these possibilities, but both represent improved pig welfare.
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spelling pubmed-89098122022-03-11 The “Real Welfare” Scheme: Changes in UK Finishing Pig Welfare since the Introduction of Formal Welfare Outcome Assessment Pandolfi, Fanny Barber, Claire Edwards, Sandra Animals (Basel) Article SIMPLE SUMMARY: Farm animal welfare is an important issue for both farmers and the general public. In order to monitor animal welfare on a large population of finishing pig farms in the UK, the “Real Welfare” project developed a methodology for on-farm assessment based on regular measurement of some key animal-based measures, so-called welfare outcomes. This paper presents estimates of the percentage of these different welfare outcomes over the years since the inception of the scheme. Between 2016 and 2019, the mean percentage of pigs in the mainstream herd showing four mandatory welfare outcomes (pigs requiring hospitalization, lame pigs, pigs with severe tail lesions, and pigs with severe body marks) was very low and a decreasing trend was observed for all outcomes except severe tail lesions. These data give good representation of the overall situation in the UK finishing pig population. ABSTRACT: Farm animal welfare is an increasingly important issue, leading to the need for an efficient methodology to deliver accurate benchmarking. The “Real Welfare” project developed a methodology based on regular recording of a limited number of animal-based measures, so-called welfare outcomes, which allows faster and easier on-farm assessment of finishing pig welfare. The objective of this paper is to estimate, with sufficient robustness and confidence, the prevalence of different mandatory and optional welfare outcomes in the mainstream herd of the finishing farms in the UK based on the “Real Welfare” scheme data and to assess the changes in prevalence over time, inspection visits and seasons. The mean overall prevalence of the four mandatory welfare outcomes (pigs requiring hospitalization, lame pigs, pigs with severe body marks, and pigs with severe tail lesions) was very low (≤0.2%) and a significant decreasing trend was observed for the first three of these mandatory welfare outcomes since the inception of the scheme. This result might reflect either a reduction in factors giving rise to welfare problems in the mainstream herd or increasing awareness about management of compromised pigs. Additional data are required to clarify these possibilities, but both represent improved pig welfare. MDPI 2022-02-28 /pmc/articles/PMC8909812/ /pubmed/35268177 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ani12050607 Text en © 2022 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Pandolfi, Fanny
Barber, Claire
Edwards, Sandra
The “Real Welfare” Scheme: Changes in UK Finishing Pig Welfare since the Introduction of Formal Welfare Outcome Assessment
title The “Real Welfare” Scheme: Changes in UK Finishing Pig Welfare since the Introduction of Formal Welfare Outcome Assessment
title_full The “Real Welfare” Scheme: Changes in UK Finishing Pig Welfare since the Introduction of Formal Welfare Outcome Assessment
title_fullStr The “Real Welfare” Scheme: Changes in UK Finishing Pig Welfare since the Introduction of Formal Welfare Outcome Assessment
title_full_unstemmed The “Real Welfare” Scheme: Changes in UK Finishing Pig Welfare since the Introduction of Formal Welfare Outcome Assessment
title_short The “Real Welfare” Scheme: Changes in UK Finishing Pig Welfare since the Introduction of Formal Welfare Outcome Assessment
title_sort “real welfare” scheme: changes in uk finishing pig welfare since the introduction of formal welfare outcome assessment
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8909812/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35268177
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ani12050607
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