The Trade-Off Between Chicken Welfare and Public Health Risks in Poultry Husbandry: Significance of Moral Convictions

Abstract

Welfare-friendly outdoor poultry husbandry systems are associated with potentially higher public health risks for certain hazards, which results in a dilemma: whether to choose a system that improves chicken welfare or a system that reduces these public health risks. We studied the views of citizens and poultry farmers on judging the dilemma, relevant moral convictions and moral arguments in a practical context. By means of an online questionnaire, citizens (n = 2259) and poultry farmers (n = 100) judged three practical cases, which illustrate the dilemma of improving chicken welfare or reducing public health risks for Campylobacter, avian influenza and dioxin. Furthermore, they scored the importance of moral arguments and to what extend they agreed with moral convictions related to humans and chickens. Citizens were more likely than farmers to choose a system that benefits chicken welfare at the expense of public health. These different judgments could be explained by differing moral convictions and valuations of moral arguments. Judgments of citizens and farmers were associated with moral arguments and convictions, predominantly with those regarding the value of chickens and naturalness. Citizens agreed stronger with moral convictions regarding the intrinsic value of chickens and regarding naturalness than farmers did, while farmers agreed stronger with conviction regarding fairness. We argue that opinions of citizens and farmers are context-dependent, which may explain the differences between these groups. It implies that opinions of different stakeholder groups should be considered in order to achieve successful innovations in poultry husbandry, which are supported by society.

Naturalness and the Legitimacy of Thoroughbred Racing: A Photo-Elicitation Study with Industry and Animal Advocacy Informants

“…The tendency for people to value naturalness is confirmed by subsequent studies [53][54][55]. People compare a variety of aspects to what is natural, including animals having enough space and associated freedom to behave according to their natural instincts, having access to the outdoors and to unadulterated feed [52] (p. 46), and they refer to freedom of movement and a natural lifespan [53]. People consider eating pelleted feed as being against the animal's nature [56] (p. 195).…”

“…They [52] (p. 462) summarise that people find naturalness is important for the physical and psychological wellbeing of animals, and the hampering of natural behaviour is seen as having a negative impact on the animals' overall health. The tendency for people to value naturalness is confirmed by subsequent studies [53][54][55]. People compare a variety of aspects to what is natural, including animals having enough space and associated freedom to behave according to their natural instincts, having access to the outdoors and to unadulterated feed [52] (p. 46), and they refer to freedom of movement and a natural lifespan [53].…”

Ethical Decision-Making in Zoonotic Disease Control

“…This can partly be explained because our respondents are a selective group involved in One Health policymaking. The context in which our respondents operate probably influences their balancing of values related to humans and animals (van Asselt et al 2019). The answers of our respondents are therefore not representative for the view of the general public.…”

Leg health of meat chickens: impact on welfare, consumer behaviour, and the role of environmental enrichment

“…As with the RSPCA scheme, FREPA's accreditation program aims to provide consumers with an alternative to products from conventionally grown chickens. Although FREPA does not share the same brand recognition and consumer trust as the RSPCA, consumers do associate 'free-range' products with improved welfare (Cornish et al 2018;van Asselt et al 2019).…”

“…There is an increasing awareness by consumers of the conditions in which animals destined for human consumption are grown (Boogaard et al 2006;Cornish et al 2018;van Asselt et al 2019). Further, Australians show an affinity for animal products produced under welfare friendly conditions (Taylor and Signal 2009;Cornish et al 2018).…”