To get more from your animal, take good care of it

Livestock is the basic unit of farming. Domestication of animals is as old as human history. Human beings need animals for their daily existence. But many a farmer are not aware that animals are conscious beings, meaning that just like you and me, they have the ability to feel, perceive or experience subjectivity.

Although they exist to supplement human life by giving food, labour and companionship, their welfare must be catered to as a pre-condition to the mutual relationship between them and man.

The five freedoms for animals

Animal welfare is defined as how an animal is coping mentally and physically with the conditions within which it lives.

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Animal welfare is determined by the five freedoms: Freedom from hunger or thirst, freedom from fear and distress, freedom from discomfort, freedom from pain, injury or disease and freedom to express natural behavior.

These freedoms are a simplified way of describing good animal husbandry. The five freedoms mean the animal is provided with fresh water and good quality feeds, is handled humanely, is kept in a clean environment and is appropriately and treated for any diseases and injuries in good time.

When an animal is taken care of, it lives long, produces more and safe products for the public and therefore lives in perfect harmony with its caretaker – human beings – and that was the design of man/animal relationship.

Animal welfare concerns aren’t just about domesticated animals it extends to even those in the wild whose habitat is being continually encroached on by man.

Animal Abuse

High human populations have increased demand for animal products. Subsequently, farmers are resorting to intensive farming to meet this high demand. The causalities unfortunately are the animals who in this food chain occupy the most important level.

Crowding of pigs and poultry has resulted in animals suffering unnecessary stress to satiate human demand for food. Other animals are raised while suffering from disease conditions related to confinement, low exercise, and a diet designed for quick maturity. The rampant use of antibiotics as growth promoters for example has now resulted in the development of Anti-Microbial Resistance the world over. 

Pet abuse

Changes in social lives has increased demand for pets of various types. This has resulted in dogs being produced in large number under very filthy conditions to meet the demands of many people who want to buy dogs as pets. Worse is the global trafficking of other pets like snakes, parrots, pangolins, lizards among others.

These animals are being transported for long distances in suitcases without food and taken into new homes with very different climatic conditions compared to their native homes or kept in zoos and cages for people’s enjoyment.

Some are slaughtered inhumanely under a false belief that they are traditional medicine. This is like modern day slavery and it is happening because man has ceased to see animals as sentient beings that need to be accorded good care because they too experience emotions just like me and you.

Animal negligence

However, farms are the main points where animal welfare is abused through production systems and negligence. This is ironical considering that livestock is the main source of income for farmers. A little tender love and care goes a long way in increasing the amount of milk a cow produces.

Research has it that playing music and being gentle to a cow increases its milk production. There are many benefits that farmers can get from animals whose welfare is taken good care of but there are many losses that can accrue from animal welfare abuse.

(Tennyson Williams is the Director for World Animal Protection)