Université Clermont Auvergne, INRAE, VetAgro-Sup, UMR Herbivores, 63122 Saint-Genès-Champanelle, France.
School of Geography and Planning, Cardiff University, UK.
Animal. 2021 Jan;15(1):100038. doi: 10.1016/j.animal.2020.100038. Epub 2020 Dec 9.
Official inspections to check the compliance of farms with European legislation to protect farm animals are often perceived negatively by farmers. In addition, the inspections have a limited effect on improving farm compliance. We looked at the perceptions of both farmers and their inspectors about animal welfare and the inspections in a case study of dairy production in France. The identification of gaps and commonalities between both parties should help us to propose improvements in the inspection method by which inspections could more likely encourage compliance with animal welfare legislation. To achieve this aim, we conducted semi-structured interviews with 22 dairy farmers and their 19 inspectors. Both farmers and inspectors described animal welfare in terms of the state of the animal and of the living conditions and care provided to them. The majority of farmers found that the official checklist used by the inspectors is inappropriate to assess the welfare of their animals; inspectors themselves reported that they often use their own criteria and indicators (often based on the observation of animals) in addition to the official checklist. Both groups disagreed with some requirements of the legislation. These findings suggest that the content and background of the legislation to protect animals should be made clearer to both farmers and inspectors and that these two groups of actors should be involved in the definition of key points to be checked on farms, with special attention to animal-based indicators. All this could improve farmers' engagement with the results of the inspections and, hopefully, could lead to better compliance with legislation and improvements in animal welfare on farms.
官方检查旨在检查农场是否符合保护农场动物的欧洲法规，但这些检查往往会被农民视为负面的。此外，这些检查对提高农场的合规性效果有限。我们在法国的奶制品生产案例研究中，研究了农民及其检查员对动物福利和检查的看法。确定双方之间的差距和共同点，应该有助于我们提出改进检查方法的建议，使检查更有可能鼓励遵守动物福利法规。为了实现这一目标，我们对 22 名奶农及其 19 名检查员进行了半结构化访谈。农民和检查员都用动物的状态、生活条件和提供的照顾来描述动物福利。大多数农民认为检查员使用的官方清单不适合评估他们动物的福利；检查员自己报告说，他们经常除了使用官方清单之外，还会使用自己的标准和指标（通常基于对动物的观察）。这两个群体都不同意该立法的一些要求。这些发现表明，应向农民和检查员阐明保护动物的立法的内容和背景，并且应该让这两个群体的行为者参与确定农场需要检查的要点的定义，特别要关注基于动物的指标。所有这些都可以提高农民对检查结果的参与度，并希望能更好地遵守法规，并改善农场的动物福利。
