Why Does Higher Animal Welfare Cost More?

For pigs, meat chickens, and layer hens, creating better welfare conditions often begins with giving animals more space, meaning;

• more room to display natural behaviours, and less frustration;
• better rest periods as less jostling from other animals engaged in other activities (resting animals vs those eating or drinking, or foraging);
• reduced pathogen load and fewer disease outbreaks;
• reduced amount of manure resulting in better air and litter (bedding) quality.

However, providing more space means fewer animals can be housed, in which may lower production, or require additional land and facilities. These changes often come with significant extra cost.

Providing appropriate shade and shelter for farmed animals, such as sheep and cattle is essential for good welfare, yet many farms still find it challenging to meet this need. Not only does shade and shelter ensure animals can remain comfortable in different weather conditions, provision of shade and shelter can support improvements in productivity and decrease mortality. Shade and shelter reduces heat stress, helps animals maintain normal body temperatures in cold weather, and supports normal behaviours (resting and rumination). Dairy cows and dairy sheep produce more milk in hot weather when they have access to shade, and good shelter in lambing paddocks helps protect young lambs and reduces mortality.

However, provision of effective shade and shelter can have economic ramifications that farmers must consider. The initial cost of buying trees, along with materials to protect plants from stock browsing and bad weather , can be significant. Tree planting can be labour intensive and add to overall costs. Whilst trees provide shade for sheep and cattle, but might also shade the ground that grows grass, slowing growth in cooler seasons. Trees also make it more difficult to mow paddocks or to plant out crops, and they can restrict the use of other farming equipment such as pivot irrigators.

All animals should be provided with appropriate pain relief to reduce the negative welfare effects of painful husbandry procedures that are sometimes required on farms. It also helps animals with a more comfortable, and often quicker, recovery from injury or disease by decreasing inflammation and promoting healing. Treatment plans for injury or disease such as lameness or mastitis, as well as routine procedures such as disbudding, castration and tailing should therefore include the provision of pain relief drugs.

Providing pain relief comes with an added cost – cost of the drugs, increased time and labour to carry out the procedure, staff training and (potentially) veterinary fees. For some drugs, there are also additional costs as you can't sell milk or meat during the waiting period after treatment, and to store drugs appropriately and effectively.

The provision (and maintenance) of suitable bedding material helps ensure better animal welfare, being a highly valued resource. Hay, straw, sawdust, or wood shavings help provide a comfortable surface for resting. They also provide valuable enrichment for animals, allowing them to express species-specific behaviours, such as pigs rooting around in straw. Having the ability to engage with enriching materials like straw can help decrease unwanted pig behaviours that can negatively impact animal welfare, such as fighting or tail-biting. For chickens, providing dry, loose bedding allows them to dust bathe, a behaviour that they are highly motivated to perform and which supports feather and skin health. The flip-side is the increased cost – not only from buying the materials and having to dispose of them, but also from the additional labour required to manage and maintain the bedding in a hygienic and comfortable condition.

‘Higher welfare’ can mean changing a farming system drastically, affecting its economics substantially. For example, extended cow-calf contact is a rare thing in commercial NZ dairy farm systems, but we know that allowing calves to have more time with their dams are beneficial for both the cow and the calf. However, it can be complicated in the current conventional dairy systems.

Cows might only be milked once a day in these systems, and the overall volume of milk collected is lower, as the calf also shares the milk. Traditional milking shed facilities may require some modification to allow for young calves to come in with the cows, and there is more fencing requirements in the paddocks. While some labour demands (specifically, calf feeding) are decreased, they are increased in other areas, including managing the milking parlour flow, separating and rejoining cows and calves at different times, increased mob management, and ensuring calves receive enough handling to be quiet around people when they are older. Because of the significant time and patience needed to build relationships with the cows and the calves to make this system a success, combined with the lower milk yield, commercial farms have struggled to make this a financially viable option. But there are farmers out there who are blazing the way for change.

Cow-calf contact systems could help to partly address a significant issue in the dairy industry –the bobby calf. If all calves are kept on their mothers and reared on farm, young animals get to experience life and positive experiences, rather than being treated as waste or by-products. In order to achieve this however, there may need to be fewer cows on farm, to account for the increased number of calves eating grass, or alternatively, more feed purchased and brought onto farm. There may be increased costs associated with sexed semen and bull breed selection, as farmers attempt to get female calves from high performing dairy breed bulls, and get male calves from fast-growing beef breed bulls, to meet the opposing needs. As well, there needs to be a market for these ‘dairy beef’ calves to move into; many traditional finishing systems prefer pure beef as they grow more muscle, and faster. Farm-system shifts, such as increasing cow-calf contact and rearing all calves are truly enormous undertakings, but are a huge step forward for animal welfare.

SPCA Certified asks farmers to achieve various standards which directly or indirectly result in better animal welfare on farm. But, as described above, it can come at significant cost. Members of the programme invest money to ensure they meet programme standards, and they prioritise management systems that make life better for their animals. Whilst higher welfare farming can come with additional costs, it also brings benefits.

So next time you are in the supermarket, weighing up your choices and wondering ‘is it worth paying more’ for higher welfare products, such as SPCA Certified branded products, remember the commitment made by farmers to improve animal welfare on their farm. By buying products that support higher animal welfare, you are sending a clear message that animal welfare is important and you support farmers that care for their animals. With your support we can push for better (and sometimes bolder) farming innovations and systems that best serve the needs of the animals.