Update welzijnsprestaties biologische veehouderij = Update animal welfare status of organic farming in the Netherlands

Abstract

Organic farming intends to farm in a socially responsible manner, with attention for, among others, environment, climate, nature and landscape, food quality, income and animal welfare. This report focuses on animal welfare, as one of the sustainability themes. The existing knowledge about the subject is listed for the dairy cow, pig, poultry, sheep and goat sectors. Welfare performance is based on animal characteristics and is categorised under four welfare classes: behaviour, health, comfort and feeding (Welfare Quality®, 2009). Because no generally accepted and valid way exists to weigh welfare criteria against one another, only individual ones are used for explaining welfare performance. This report gives an overview of the current animal welfare status in Dutch organic livestock farming. On the basis of improvement points an agenda has been formulated to (further) improve animal welfare in organic farming