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What better way to learn more about important areas related to chicken welfare then to visit those who actively work on it? Members of the Joint Animal Welfare Working Group (JAWWG) are planning to travel to Arkansas, USA, in April to visit the Tyson Welfare Research Farm to meet representatives from Tyson Foods and Cobb-Vantress. The group hopes to learn from researchers there about the latest science on key welfare topics for chickens.
Continuous improvement is integral to the Raised by a Canadian Farmer Animal Care Program. To foster this, CFC and the Canadian Poultry and Egg Processors (CPEP) created the Joint Animal Welfare Working Group, aimed at supporting the ongoing review of animal welfare practices, processes, and procedures of the Canadian chicken sector.
The composition of the JAWWG includes a balanced representation with members from CFC and CPEP. Many advances have been made recently on welfare-related topics such as enrichment, lighting, and in the use of the concept of the Five Domains (nutrition, environment, health, behaviour and mental state) to assess and improve chicken welfare.
The JAWWG’s mandate is to provide recommendations to CFC Board of Directors pertaining to the regular review of animal welfare for CFC’s Animal Care Program, and to provide regular updates on its activities to CPEP Board of Directors. Among many things, the JAWWG is mandated to identify and prioritize different aspects of broiler welfare for improvement, assembling science-based recommendations for specific broiler welfare topics covered in the National Farm Animal Care Council (NFACC) poultry code to be implemented in the Animal Care Program. CFC expects that the review of poultry code will be initiated in 2024.
