The Five Freedoms in the global animal agriculture market: Challenges and achievements as opportunities

Abstract

• Economic development and the evolution of societal ethical principles are leading consumer demands and pressuring animal agriculture sectors to alter some production practices. This is an undergoing event in developed countries, and is relevant for the future, especially in emerging economies where there is an increasingly fast expansion of intensive confined swine and poultry production. This scenario is foreseen, in the authors' opinions, as a major challenge for the pro-animal welfare public and the scientific community that has a critical role in addressing concerns with impartial, validated, and objective science. • The current climate towards improving animal welfare has favored diffusion of technologies that seek to minimize suffering of animals, such as immune-castrations in pigs, which is a task best accomplished by well informed and specialized farm animal welfare professionals. Increasing concern with animal welfare has also resulted in gradual banning of certain husbandry practices and housing in many industrialized countries; changes in attitudes and practices have been slower in developing countries, some of which are major meat exporters. • Legislative actions and voluntary initiatives across the European Union and Unites States endorse forthcoming rearing practices favoring animal welfare, especially in the pig and poultry industries, and have been a source of international trade controversy among animal protection organizations, the World Trade Organization, and global market players.