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To the market and back? A study of the interplay between public policy and market-driven initiatives to improve farm animal welfare in the Danish pork sector

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Abstract

This article discusses the interplay of public policy and market-driven initiatives to improve farm animal welfare (FAW). Over the last couple of decades, the notion of ‘market-driven animal welfare’ has become popular, but can the market deliver the FAW that consumers and politicians expect? Using the Danish pork sector as the empirical setting, this article studies efforts to improve private FAW standards following changes to general regulations. The analysis shows that ethical misgivings regarding the adequacy of current and prospective FAW standards are tempered by the economic considerations that guide the practices of some actors. The study also shows that efforts to improve FAW standards are contingent on collaboration and coordination across globalised markets among actors with divergent interests. The findings have important implications for market practices and public policy in relation to FAW.

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Notes

  1. Welfare pork is defined as pork that meets higher FAW requirements than conventional production.

  2. The following brief historic overview of animal welfare regulation in Denmark is based on Broberg (2016).

  3. An enabling act is a law that empowers an administrative body (typically a government minister or public authority) to regulate actitivies within a certain area, e.g., to set more specific regulations of animal welfare through ministerial orders.

  4. The Council of Europe is a supranational collaboration of 47 European countries set up in 1949 to promote democracy and protect human rights and the rule of law in Europe. It should not be confused with the European Union, which currently has 28 members. The European Union was preceded by the European Economic Community (until 1993) and the European Community (until 2009).

  5. The directive lays down the minimum standards for the protection of pigs confined for rearing and fattening. For instance, the use of tethers is prohibited and members states are required to ensure that sows and gilts are kept in groups during a period starting from 4 weeks after the service to 1 week before the expected time of farrowing. Furthermore, the directive sets minimum requirements for the total unobstructed floor area available to each gilt after service and to each sow when gilts and/or sows are kept in groups, as well as to the flooring surface. Sows and gilts must have permanent access to manipulable material. Certain exemptions are possible for small producers and pigs that have to be kept in groups that are particularly aggressive, that have been attacked by other pigs or that are sick or injured may temporarily be kept in individual pens.

  6. In addition to the domestic market, twenty interviews were conducted in relation to market practices in Australia, China/Hong Kong, Great Britain, Sweden and the United States. These are all important export markets for Danish pork, and discussions with Danish practitioners suggested that FAW differed in importance across these countries.

  7. All quotes have been translated from Danish to English. An effort has been made to stay as close as possible to the words used during the interviews.

  8. It is beyond the scope of this paper to discuss the differences seen to exist between export markets in detail.

Abbreviations

EEC:

European Economic Community

EU:

European Union

FAW:

Farm animal welfare

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Acknowledgements

This research was made possible by a grant from the Danish Pig Levy Foundation. The author thanks Maja Pedersen and Kathrine Nørgaard Hansen for their invaluable assistance with conducting the interviews and initial analyses. Furthermore,the author thanks Klaus Brønd Laursen and the two anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments and feedback.

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  1. Department of Management, Aarhus University, Fuglesangs Allé 4, 8210, Aarhus V, Denmark

    Lars Esbjerg

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Appendix 1: Informants

Appendix 1: Informants

Twenty informants were interviewed about the Danish market during fall 2012 and winter and spring 2013. Interviews were conducted with three primary producers (a conventional pig producer, a free-range pig producer and an organic pig producer), sales managers from two large Danish slaughterhouses, a project manager from a company marketing organic and free-range meat and the corporate communications manager of a large meat processor. Furthermore, interviews were conducted with three retailers: a soft discount chain, a mid-market supermarket chain and an upmarket supermarket chain. For each retailer, the interviews involved the relevant category manager/retail buyer at the corporate level, a store manager and a store-level butcher/category manager. Finally, we interviewed representatives of three stakeholder organisations working with animal welfare in different ways: the communication manager and the project manager responsible for pigs at a large Danish animal rights organisation, the area manager of an organisation representing Danish farmers and the Danish food industry and the area manager for housing and environment of an organisation in charge of research and development tasks related to live pigs communicating knowledge obtained through these activities to practitioners.

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Esbjerg, L. To the market and back? A study of the interplay between public policy and market-driven initiatives to improve farm animal welfare in the Danish pork sector. Agric Hum Values 37, 963–981 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10460-020-10023-x

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