Simão Zacarias recently attended a workshop about participatory engagement in animal welfare science which took place next Monday the 31st of March at Harper Adams University - England.
Simão Zacarias (Centre) with (Left) Professor Ken Sloan (Vice-chancellor and CEO of Harper Adams University) and (Right) Professor Donald Maurice Broom (Department of Veterinary Medicine, University of Cambridge)
The “why”, “who”, and “how” of engaging stakeholders with a focus on animal welfare was addressed. Engaging with stakeholders in research helps with anticipating opportunities and risks, understanding how religion and culture affect the treatment of animals, and in improving adoption processes. Stakeholders considered include people in the food industry, citizens, the living environment (e.g. farmland) and farm animals. A special point was made to think of including farm animals when doing engagement research work because this group is often forgotten. Animal welfare science should therefore recognize animals as important (if not the primary) stakeholders. Animals are not just research subjects; they are subjects themselves. Their welfare needs should be considered when designing, implementing and applying any research. In addition, creating public dialogue e.g. through use of the “The Food Conversation” platform in the UK, are good ways to engage with stakeholders.
The case for interdisciplinary animal welfare science was made at the workshop. Three means of interdisciplinary animal welfare have been proposed: 1) Science implementation-led interdisciplinary animal welfare science; 2) Study of professionals/cultures/worlds that broker the human-animal relations in some way; and 3) Global challenges/wicked problems that touch on human-animal relations. All of those interdisciplinary approaches are challenged to not overlook the connections between meeting the welfare needs of sentient animals against the wider challenges that connect to society-animal relations.
The workshop was good food for thought on the theoretical basis of welfare science, with the central questions being how do the animal welfare concepts reflects the interests of different stakeholders?