On November,13th 2024, Anja B. Riber participated in the NordCAW Poultry Welfare Conference 2024, at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU) in Uppsala, Sweden. Her oral communication was entitled "What’s on the European poultry welfare agenda". The talk addressed specific poultry welfare topics that are currently of interest to many EU stakeholders, including growth rate of broilers, on-farm hatching; male layer chicks, keel bone fracture, end-of...

The fourth Reflection Board meeting between representatives of RB organisations (from the EU Platform on Animal Welfare) and the EURCAW-Poultry-SFA was held remotely via Teams on October, 22th 2024 afternoon.   In total 10 participants, five of them from the seven EU platform entities forming the RB (one participant represented two entities), two from DG SANTE (as observers), and three from EURCAW-Poultry-SFA, were connected.   This meeting was the occasion to present the...

Organized by EURCAW-Poultry-SFA. The webinar was held via Teams. Target audience: Official inspectors from the Competent Authorities of the EU MSs. Attendance through invitation only.   The PDF of the presentation is available here. The webinar recording will be available here soon.    Description:  Current European Union legislation on welfare of animals at the time of killing requires stunning before slaughter to render the animals...

The Centre is celebrating the publication of its seventh scientific article as a result of the work carried out in Activity 3 in 2023-2024.  This study evaluated the validity, inter-assessor reliability and intra-assessor repeatability of three visual scoring systems for litter quality, one known as the Welfare Quality Assessment Protocol© and two complementary systems for friability and humidity developed by the ClassyFarm initiative.   This article named...

The fifth EU-network meeting between representatives of EU MS Competent Authorities (CAs) and the EURCAW-Poultry-SFA, took place virtually on October 01-02, 2024 on 2 *0,5 days. In total 49 participants, from 22 EU MSs participated, including 29 delegates from CAs, 13 from EURCAW-Poultry-SFA, and 7 observers: one DG SANTE unit G5 representatives, three EFSA representatives, and tthree EFTA representatives.    This meeting was the occasion to present the Centre’s work...

On 17 September the four EURCAWs hosted an online meeting with National Reference Centres (NRCs) for Animal Welfare and the Supporting Bodies (SBs) of Competent Authorities. Over 50 people attended the meeting, with representation from across EU Member States. The meeting started with presentations from the EURCAWs, including an introduction to EURCAW Aqua (designated in January 2024), two NRCs and one SB. As the aim of the meeting is to explore ways to collaborate, workshops and interactive...

The Centre is celebrating the publication of its sixth scientific article as a result of the work carried out in Activity 2 in 2023.  A review of the technical and scientific literature on existing methods for assessing walking ability in broilers was conducted, and the reliability, validity and feasibility of the different methods were assessed when relevant information was available. This review named " Overview of the various methods used to assess walking...

Organized by EURCAW-Poultry-SFA. The webinar was held via Teams. Target audience: Official inspectors from the Competent Authorities of the EU MSs Attendance through invitation only.     The PDF of the presentation is available here. The webinar recording is available here.    Description: Directive 98/58/EC concerning the protection of animals kept for farming purposes requires that Member States ensure that animals are kept under...

The first in-person meeting of the four EU Reference Centres for Animal Welfare (EURCAW Pigs, Poultry and other small farmed animals, Ruminants & Equines, and Aqua) was held on 6 & 7 June in Thessaloniki, Greece. With approx. 40 participants the meeting started with a series of interesting ice-breakers, followed by interactive sessions to exchange ideas about communications and training, quality assurance and scientific outputs. On the second day, members of each Centre were asked to...

The Centre is proud of presenting you its latest infographic issued from a Q2E answer, realized in collaboration with La Chaire bien-être animal: for manual handling and carrying turkeys. A graphic tool for operators in the field for improved turkey welfare !  The document is available here.