Definition of criteria for overall assessment of animal welfare

Abstract

Welfare is multidimensional, comprising good health, comfort, expression of behaviour, and so on. Its overall assessment therefore requires a multicriteria evaluation. The set of criteria shall be exhaustive (no missing item), minimal (only necessary items), agreed by stakeholders, and legible (a limited number of criteria). Furthermore, the interpretation from one criterion shall not depend on that from another. We propose a set of 12 subcriteria grouped into four criteria: feeding, housing, health and optimised emotional states. This work will assist in developing measures to be used on-form to form a European standard for overall assessment of animal welfare

Keywords

animal welfare; integration; multicriteria evaluation; overall assessment

Published in

Animal Welfare
2007, volume: 16, number: 2, pages: 225-228
Publisher: UNIV FEDERATION ANIMAL WELFARE

SLU Authors

• Keeling, Linda

  • Department of Applied Animal Science and Welfare, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

UKÄ Subject classification

Animal and Dairy Science
Veterinary Science

Publication identifier

• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/s0962728600031390

Permanent link to this page (URI)

https://res.slu.se/id/publ/16779