Farm animal welfare indicators: a critical review
Abstract
The aim of this review was to analyze and discuss the use of different indicators of animal welfare (AW) in farm animals. Practices such as castration, tail docking, weaning, transport and slaughter induce a stress response, often accompanied by pain and injuries. This can affect the productive results, both in quantity and quality of the product, and have a negative impact on AW. In this review, we discuss a number of indicators of AW and propose that a combination of them should be used to assess AW in farm animals. Many indicators of AW have been validated for certain types of handling and production systems, mainly in European countries. However, since environment, management and production systems may influence the stress response, it is necessary to develop indicators appropriate to production systems in Latin America.
