Alain Boissy – Research Director at UMR Herbivores and Director of the National Reference Centre for Animal Welfare (CNR-BEA)(testimonial from the “Animal welfare: Science to inform public policy” dossier -2021)
“I’ve been studying the behaviour of farm animals and their emotional and cognitive capacities for over 30 years, and I’ve seen the issue of animal welfare come to the fore. In the post-war period, intensive animal production met the food needs of the time, with animals as a ‘raw material’. Declining animal performance and abnormal animal behaviour, health crises and the conditions under which animals were reared and slaughtered on a mass scale revealed the limits of the system. Under pressure from animal protection associations and to accompany the introduction of European regulations, an international science of animal welfare emerged, initially focusing on animal behaviour and stress physiology, then on their emotions and mental states. In France, from 1995 onwards, under the impetus of INRAE, a multidisciplinary scientific community developed via the AgriBEA network, which was open to animal protection associations, and expanded with the BEA Joint Technology Network, which brought together livestock farming professionals. The CNR BEA, set up in 2017, supports a collaborative dynamic to disseminate knowledge and support public authorities. Its ultimate aim: to take greater account of the welfare of all animals, for which humans are responsible”.
Testimonial from our thematic dossier
Thematic dossier
Animal welfare: science to inform public policy
Although animal welfare is now a pressing concern in our society, the issue first came to the fore in the 1960s as a reaction to the intensive farming conditions developed to optimise practices and increase economic profitability at the expense of animals. It was in the 1980s, under the impetus of a few pioneering researchers, that the issue of animal welfare began to be taken into account at INRAE.
This dossier retraces the major stages in the Institute’s investment in this area, through Research
and in support of related public policies.
