Nordic Animal Health and Contingency meeting: Future solutions: production efficiency, health, welfa

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Nordic Animal Health and Contingency
meetingFuture solutions production
efficiency, health, welfare and economics

• John Webster
• Professor Emeritus,
• University of Bristol, UK

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Where are we now? Achievements
Related problems

• Production diseases
• too cheap food
• obesity and related diseases
• Animals treated as commodities
• Consumers divorced from the land
• Environmental destruction

• High productivity
• (near limits)
• Cheap, safe, plentiful food
• Industrialisation of feeding, housing and
  management

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The Genealogy of the Factory Farm
FARM INPUTS
OFF-FARM INPUTS
SUBSIDIES
Feed
Land
Feed
Power Machines
INTENSIVE HOUSING
POLLUTION
OUTPUT
Therapeutics
Disease
Resistance
INCOME
WELFARE
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What do we want from our farmers?

• Most of the people most of the time
• Enough food and clothing
• Rich people (pre ca.1970)
• More choice, more meat, milk and eggs
• Rich people (ca. 1970 2007)
• Animal welfare, organic food, local origins
• Frightened, not quite so rich people (post 2007)
• Affordable food, fuel, less CO2, CH4 (etc.)

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Future trends

• World-wide increase in consumption of animal
  produce
• Increased competition for resources between
  humans and animals
• food, water, biofuels etc.
• Increased need to protect and preserve quality of
  environment
• land, water sources, wildlife, GH gases etc.
• Increased consumer demand for improvements to
  husbandry
• animal welfare and land use

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• By 2030, if Chinas people are consuming at the
  same rate as Americans they will eat 2/3rds of
  the entire global harvest and burn 100M barrels
  of oil a day, or 125 of current world output

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Complementarity sharing of resources
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Complementarity Options for animal feeding

• Food we cannot eat (especially for ruminants)
• Existing
• Maize gluten, oilseed residues, beet pulp
• Future
• High protein residues from biofuels
• Modified/prefermented fibres
• Food we waste (especially pigs and poultry)
• e.g supermarket wastes illegal for no good
  reason

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Complementarity Efficiency Milk v. Eggs
Food food directly available to humans
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Improving husbandry and welfareaction on-farm

• Better identification of hazards and
  quantification of risks to animal health and
  welfare
• HACCP programmes
• Better (independent?) animal-based assessment of
  welfare
• Implementation of herd health and welfare
  strategy
• Development of alternative systems
• Free range, organic, improved intensive
• Rewards for increased attention to health and
  welfare
• Improved production efficiency (limited scope)
• Financial rewards for increased attention to
  welfare

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Dairy cattle lamenessCategorisation of hazards

• Tangible hazards on-farm
• 80 potential hazards arising from the
  environment, management or animal condition
  identified on farm and scored for risk (0-4)
• Proximate hazards at-foot
• 11 categories of hazard defined on the basis of
  similar direct actions on the foot.

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Dairy cattle lamenessProximate hazards 1.
Environmental
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Dairy cattle lamenessProximate hazards 2.
Managemental
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Dairy cattle lamenessProximate hazards 3. Animal
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Ranking of proximate hazards for severe lameness
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Improving husbandry and welfareaction on-farm

• Better identification of hazards and
  quantification of risks to animal health and
  welfare
• HACCP programmes
• Better (independent?) animal-based assessment of
  welfare
• Implementation of herd health and welfare
  strategy
• Development of alternative systems
• Free range, organic
• Rewards for increased attention to health and
  welfare
• Improved production efficiency (limited scope)
• Financial rewards for increased attention to
  welfare

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Well-being

• Fit and happy
• sustained physical and mental health
• -absence of disease
• -absence of suffering (e.g.pain, fear,
  exhaustion)
• feeling good (happy)
• -comfort, companionship, security

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Freedoms and Provisions

• Freedom from hunger and thirst
• access to fresh water and a diet to maintain full
  health and vigour
• Freedom from discomfort
• a suitable environment .e.g. shelter and a
  comfortable resting place
• Freedom from pain, injury and disease
• prevention and/or rapid diagnosis and treatment
• Freedom from fear and stress
• ensure conditions which avoid mental suffering
• Freedom to express normal behaviour
• ensure sufficient space, proper facilities and
  social contact

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Animal Sentience

• Feelings that matter

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The elements of good husbandry and animal welfare
RESOURCES food accommodation
MANAGEMENT procedures stockmanship
Provision HUSBANDRY
RECORDS health fertility
Outcome WELFARE
FITNESS
FEELINGS
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Pathogens, environment, stress and infectious
disease
high
HOST WELFARE
low
ENVIRONMENTAL CHALLENGE
ADAPTATION
PATHOGEN VIRULENCE
IMMUNITY
low
INFECTION
RESISTANCE
DISEASE
high
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Welfare QualityProgressive evaluation structure
Measures
Criteria
Principles
Overall assessment
30 on-farm measures developed by animal
scientists
4 main independent dimensions describing welfare
12 Preference dimensions giving value judgment
1 Synthetic information attached to a product
Advice to farmers
Information to consumers
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The Bristol Welfare Assurance Programme

• Bristol protocols for animal-based assessment of
  farm animal welfare
• Examples
• Dairy cows
• Free range hens
• www.vetschool.bristol.ac.uk/animalwelfare

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Monitoring dairy cows

• Nutrition
• condition, digestion
• Fertility
• Mastitis
• Lameness
• External appearance
• Behaviour
• resting, social

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Example requiring action - intervention level
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• Farms do not perform consistently well or badly
• i.e. Good at some aspects , poor at others

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Improving husbandry and welfareaction on-farm

• Better identification of hazards and
  quantification of risks to animal health and
  welfare
• HACCP programmes
• Better (independent?) animal-based assessment of
  welfare
• Implementation of herd health and welfare
  strategy
• Development of alternative systems
• Free range, organic
• Rewards for increased attention to health and
  welfare
• Improved production efficiency (limited scope)
• Financial rewards for increased attention to
  welfare

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Alternatives free range hens

• Protocol robust
• no significant between observer variation
• Welfare on most farms was satisfactory
• 22 calm, 3 anxious
• Attitude best assessed by Arousal and NOVOB
• Arousal, aggression but not F-peck increased with
  time
• F-peck related to arousal but not aggression
  or F-loss!
• High anxiety flocks show reduced physical
  welfare

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AlternativesFree range cows

• Pasture based
• But NZ intensive pasture solution not
  necessarily higher welfare
• Lower input/output appropriate phenotype
• Must attract higher income relative to milk
  output
• Added value products organic, local cheeses
  etc.
• Subsidies for environmental stewardship

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AlternativesImproved intensive (dairy)

• Increased use of complementary feeds
• Improved building design (comfort, movement,
  social behaviour)
• Better attention to hygiene and management
• Reduced pollution energy costs (e.g. anaerobic
  fermenters)
• Selection for improved lifetime performance
• Reduced wastage of male dairy calves

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Improving husbandry and welfareaction on-farm

• Better identification of hazards and
  quantification of risks to animal health and
  welfare
• HACCP programmes
• Better (independent?) animal-based assessment of
  welfare
• Implementation of herd health and welfare
  strategy
• Development of alternative systems
• Free range, organic
• Rewards for increased attention to health and
  welfare
• Improved production efficiency (limited scope)
• Financial rewards for increased attention to
  welfare

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Where have we gone wrong?Milk as a commodity
Milk _at_46p/litre
Fizzy water _at_ 92p/litre
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Improving husbandry and welfareaction within
society

• Legislation to impose higher welfare standards
• appropriate to factory systems but very slow
• Laying hens, veal calves, pregnant sows
• not appropriate to real farms (e.g. dairy)
• Redirection of subsidy (Cross compliance)
• directed to environmental protection and animal
  welfare
• consistent with added value farming
• QA schemes
• address provenance, environment, animal welfare
• producer, Retailer or independent (e.g. Freedom
  Foods)
• aim to improve consumer awareness and trust

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Slipping the political leashThe Power of the
People

• Laying Hens
• Brambell to EU legislation -50 years
• Freedom Food free-range eggs gt40 in 10 years
• Organic farming
• Bioethics on public display
• Ethical restaurants (coffee, beef)
• McDonalds!

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Increasing consumer demandThe 595 rule?

• Promotion of QA for FAW as a positive element of
  added value (5?)
• e.g. Freedom Foods, Waitrose (U.K.)
• Promotion of QA for FAW as a defence against
  accusations of improper practice (95?)
• Free range eggs (no cruel cages)
• Higher welfare higher price contracts for UK
  dairy farmers (Waitrose, Tesco - dont be mean to
  the farmers)

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Actions for farm animal welfare

• On farm
• animal health and welfare plan
• independent monitoring of welfare outcomes
• effective attention to risks to welfare
• review and reward
• Beyond the farm gate
• increased consumer awareness
• promotion of added value, high welfare goods
• Build up of trust from evidence-based assurances

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Quality Control Action, review and reward

• Currently most UK welfare assurance schemes are
  having little significant effect on welfare
  quality (annual chores)
• Many schemes require little or no action to
  ensure compliance
• Effective action requires time and reward
• Farmers cannot do everything at once

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The Virtuous Bicycle a delivery vehicle for
improved animal welfare
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Quality control The Producer Cycle

• Self-assessment (of resources)
• Saves time, bureaucracy
• Farmer knows most (if not best)
• Independent monitoring (of welfare outcomes)
• proven robust methods
• can concentrate on major issues (need not always
  be exhaustive-saves time)
• Action plan
• Compliance depends on perceived reward to farmer
• Reassessment
• benchmarking provides incentives for improvement
• Non-compliance results from failure to take
  effective action

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Welfare assurancebuilding trust beyond the farm
gate

• Overall assessment
• for compliance with QA scheme pass or fail
• for consumers
• Stars zero to
• WQ unclassified, basal, good, excellent
• Principles
• based on Five Freedoms or WQ
• provides evidence for more selective consumer
• justifies trust for the concerned majority

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Meat and right - less is more

• For the consumer
• better health, better conscience
• For the animals
• Better husbandry, health and welfare
• For farmers
• Better quality of life
• For the living environment
• Survival!

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Thanks !

• Especially to the Good Shepherds