Proceedings of the Second NAHWOA Workshop

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Introduction

 Network for Animal Health and Welfare in Organic Agriculture (NAHWOA) is a Concerted Action Project funded by the European Commission. The main aim of the project is to provide a joint platform for research organisations and institutions involved in organic livestock production, to enable sharing of information and ideas along with development of new research priorities, and to analyse the conventional research methodologies and their suitability to organic livestock research. It is hoped that the project will create a forum for an on-going discussion on animal health and welfare and their interrelationship within the framework of organic livestock production, in order to contribute to the development of organic regulations. The Network has 17 member organisations from 13 European countries.

The four thematic workshops planned for the years 2000–2001 are an important part of the project. The first one of these – and the 2nd NAHWOA Workshop – was held at the Palacio de la Merced in Córdoba, Spain, on 8–11 January, 2000. Some 70 delegates, from 13 European countries and from as far afield as Brazil and the USA, participated in the proceedings, working groups and field visits.

The theme of the 2nd NAHWOA Workshop was "Diversity of livestock systems and definition of animal welfare". The diversity of livestock systems within the European Conmmunity area has become particularly clear during the development of the common organic livestock production standards, in the form of EU Regulation 1804/1999. The Workshop heard several interesting papers on the subject, including an account of first-hand, field visit experience of the DEHESA farming system and of an olive farm with mixed livestock systems to utilise the by-products. In addition to a lively discussion during a session in the Workshop, the NAHWOA Working Group on organic standard development had a meeting to discuss the issue. These Proceedings include a combined report of all these discussions. This report is also submitted to the European Commission as an official NAHWOA statement on the present state of development of EU Regulation 1804/1999.

Whilst the Network had no intention of being able to produce a definition of "organic" animal welfare, the presentations and discussions during the Workshop were a major step towards a better understanding of the needs and requirements of an "organic" approach to animal welfare. It was clear, from the many official and unofficial discussions among the delegates, that there is a need to define the philosophical basis on which the human-animal relationship is founded in organic livestock production. Likewise, it was recognised that there is a need to develop practical tools to measure animal well-being on organic farms, and, above all, to help the farmers recognise animal needs and improve husbandry where needed. A report of the general discussion on this topic is also included in the Proceedings.

Whilst a report of a discussion can, at best, be an interpretation of the real events, we hope that the inclusion of such reports in these Proceedings will benefit those who were unable to participate in the Workshop. We have also included two papers presented at the 1st NAHWOA Workshop in Reading in June 1999. As no proceedings were produced from this first, organisational meeting, and as it was felt that these two papers fitted in well with the theme and location of the 2nd Workshop, they are published here.

A great many local individuals and organisations contributed to the success of the Workshop (see Acknowledgements), and we thank them all for their efforts. We would also like to thank all the speakers for their inputs, both during their presentations and throughout the Workshop. Our special thanks go to the Network partners and other delegates, whose active participation contributed greatly to the Workshop.

 

Reading, March 2000

Malla Hovi¹ & Roberto García Trujillo²

¹NAHWOA Co-ordinator, VEERU, University of Reading, P.O. Box 236, Reading RG6 6AT, UK, Tel: +44 118 9 318478, E-mail: m.hovi@reading.ac.uk

²Instituto de Sociología y Estudios Campesinos, Universidad de Córdoba, Ave. Menéndez Pidal s/n, 14004 Córdoba, España. Tel +34 957 218541, Fax: +34 957 218563, E- mail: ec1segue@uco.es


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