Theme: Health And Welfare Of Animals
For Food
The health and welfare of animals for food is of increasing importance to consumers as a food "acceptability" issue. While acceptability of food encompasses all the other themes of the conference it is foremost in consumer’s minds when considering food animal production. In addition to knowing that the product was derived from a healthy animal they want assurance that animal welfare was of a high standard when the food animals were farmed, transported and slaughtered.
NZ’s food-producing livestock have a unique health status resulting from both the geographic remoteness of the country and from the stringent biosecurity in place at the borders. Coupled with this the NZ economy earns over 50% of its total merchandise exports from what it grows, which ensures that NZ adopts global perspectives on animal health and welfare for food. The Massey University Veterinary School enjoys international high regard and is one of the first outside the USA to achieve AVMA accreditation. NZ animal health and welfare standards and their development, evaluation and management are also held in high regard internationally, as are the NZ-based sciences that underpin those standards. NZ is a full participant in international developments that emphasise critical interactions between animal health and welfare and notes health/welfare as increasingly important contributors to the acceptability of animal-derived food products to consumers.
There are existing strong NZ links, both nationally and internationally, between industry at all levels of the food production chain and the animal health/welfare science sectors. Contributions at the conference on this theme will further the debate on how research providers with expertise in animal health and welfare can work with industry to meet consumers’ expectations. Examples that could be discussed include ‘Kodavet’, a data warehousing system created by NZ scientists and software developers in collaboration with the Swiss Federal Veterinary Office. The system is integrated into industrial laboratories and slaughterhouses and facilitates tracing unusual test results or post-mortem findings including dioxin contamination, suspect TSE cases and animal welfare cases.
