1. Multicriteria assessment of the quality of farm animals' life
- Author
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Botreau, R., Veissier, I., Capdeville, J., Bracke, M., Andrew Butterworth, Keeling, L., Bonde, M., Rousing, T., Rosa, G., Reenen, K., Perny, P., Unité de Recherches sur les Herbivores (URH), Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique (INRA), Institut de l'élevage (IDELE), Animal Sciences Group, Wageningen University and Research [Wageningen] (WUR), Clinical Veterinary Science, University of Bristol [Bristol], Department of Animal Environment and Health, Swedish University of Agricultural Science, Danish Institute of Agricultural Sciences, Università degli studi di Napoli Federico II, DECISION, Laboratoire d'Informatique de Paris 6 (LIP6), Université Pierre et Marie Curie - Paris 6 (UPMC)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Université Pierre et Marie Curie - Paris 6 (UPMC)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU), University of Naples Federico II = Università degli studi di Napoli Federico II, Botreau, R., Veissier, I., Capdeville, J., Bracke, M., Butterworth, A., Keeling, L., Bonde, M., Rousing, T., DE ROSA, Giuseppe, VAN REENEN, K., and Perny, P.
- Subjects
Animal welfare ,Welfare assessment ,[SDV]Life Sciences [q-bio] ,Matemathical methods ,[INFO]Computer Science [cs] ,CRITERE DE BIEN-ETRE ,ComputingMilieux_MISCELLANEOUS ,BIEN-ETRE ANIMAL - Abstract
The European project Welfare Quality aims to produce a standard for the evaluation of the welfare of farmed cattle, pigs and poultry to be used in certification schemes. Because welfare is multidimensional, and refers to quality of life perceived by the individual, this evaluation will rest on various measures that are essentially animal-based. A reasoned approach, using methods developed in MultiCriteria Decision making, will be followed to aggregate the measures into an overall assessment. At the outset of the project, four welfare criteria were outlined as being applicable to any species: good feeding, good housing, good health, and appropriate behaviour. Each criterion was further refined into 2 to 4 subcriteria giving a total number of 12 subcriteria. The subcriteria were constructed using several mathematical methods chosen according to the number of measures contained in each subcriterion, their nature and the precision with which it is assumed they can be taken. The appropriate subcriteria were combined to evaluate each criterion, and compensations were limited by attributing more importance to the lowest subcriterion-scores, thus encouraging producers to correct the more severe problems first. The aggregation of criteria, to create an overall assessment, will aim to limit further compensations because one welfare criterion should probably not compensate for another. This progressive construction of an overall welfare assessment for farmed animals may help in the design of similar tools for other animal use situations – such as in companion animals, for labelling pet breeding units, kennels or shops.
- Published
- 2006