Consumers versus producers: a different view on farm animal welfare?

摘要

Animal welfare is more than ever a hot issue throughout the entire livestock production chain. Consumers, in their role of citizen, emphasize on the importance of animal welfare in their food decision process; retailers and producers anticipate the more and more by means of product differentiation based on animal welfare; and also governmental actions are taken (e.g. Community Action Plan on the Protection and Welfare of Animals). To facilitate the debate and prevent different stakeholders to talk atcross-purposes, it is important to assess how the concept of farm animal welfare is interpreted by the different stakeholders. A quantitative study was carried out in Flanders, April 2006, including consumers (n=459) as well as producers (n=204). Perceptions and beliefs of consumers and producers towards farm animal welfare were measured using two 5-point interval scaled questions: 'Couldyou indicate the importance of the following aspect/action, according to your personal opinion, in obtaining an acceptable level of farm animal welfare? (perceived importance); 'What is your personal opinion concerning this aspect/action; do you think that this aspect/Action entails a problem towards the animal welfare in the present Flemish agriculture? (evaluative belief). The interpretation of farm animal welfare by consumers and producers was rather analogous although the producers' perception was more fine-grained. The largest differences concerned aspects related to the expression of natural behaviour (higher relative perceived importance at consumer level). Furthermore, producers did not report major welfare problems with current Flemish livestock production practices, while consumers' perception of animal welfare in current livestock farming was generally negative.