What was the impetus for the development of the Animal Welfare Approved Standards?
Beginning in the late 1970s and continuing through the 1980s, investors in pig factories aggressively adopted the intensive confinement method of housing that had yielded increased profits in the poultry industry (at the expense of the animals), and began rearing pigs indoors under crowded, barren and restrictive conditions. In the process, traditional family farmers experienced in high welfare farming techniques, who kept their animals on pastures and in bedded barns, were being forced out of business. For the sake of the pigs who were falling victim to industrialization, AWI felt the need to become directly involved by helping meat-purchasing consumers distinguish between meat products from these two very different animal rearing systems. In 1988, following an investigation of pig behavior and welfare, including a brief study program with Dr. Alex Stolba in the “Pig Family Pen” at the University of Zurich, AWI’s Diane Halverson spearheaded the nation’s first husbandry standards progr
Related Questions
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- What was the impetus for the development of the Animal Welfare Approved Standards?
