The aWISH project: Automated animal welfare monitoring for broilers and pigs at the slaughterhouse

Animal welfare monitoring of farm animals on commercial farms is difficult to realize. Yet, collecting objective data on specific welfare indicators can be valuable to assess how a given farm or chain is performing and can be used to provide targeted advice. All farm animals that are kept for meat production will arrive at a slaughterhouse
at the end of the growing period. Sensor technology placed at the slaughterhouse can provide information on specific welfare indicators, and perhaps even aggregated overall welfare scores, and can be used to provide feedback to farmers, catching teams (in the case of poultry), transporters and slaughterhouses.


Within the aWISH project, we aim to develop methodology for automated animal welfare monitoring for broilers and pigs at the slaughterhouse. We do this by setting up six pig and broiler pilots in the different countries participating in the project. Each pilot focuses on connecting data collected at the farm (either routinely or by researchers) to data collected automatically at the slaughterhouse and investigating whether the slaughterhouse data can provide valid information regarding the on-farm welfare of the animals involved. For instance, a broiler flock with a high incidence and severity of footpad lesions is likely to have problems with wet litter, low activity
levels and a poor indoor climate during the growing period. Within aWISH, we aim to combine all this information through an interactive dashboard and we investigate whether in a future application the slaughterhouse data alone can be used to provide feedback to the farmer regarding animal welfare.

The Dutch aWISH pilot takes place at a pig slaughterhouse in The Netherlands. Here, we collaborate with a specific chain that produces pork with one star within the Dutch ‘Better Life’ label, managed by the Dutch Society for the Protection of Animals. Within that chain, approximately 12 farms will be followed for 2 cycles. A number
of welfare indicators will be recorded on farm at the beginning and at the end of the growing period. Data collection will be non-invasive and observational only, so no approval from an animal ethics committee is required. At slaughter, sensor data will be collected on the same pigs regarding vocalisations produced at unloading, wounds on the carcass and on ears and tail and tail length. Each farm has climate sensors installed, that for instance allow to monitor ammonia levels in the air. For one cycle, the farmers will receive climate advice from a trained adviser and for the other cycle, they will not (in randomized order). It is expected that the sensor data collected at slaughter can be connected to the welfare data collected on-farm. Furthermore, climate advice is expected to result in better welfare outcomes measured at slaughter.

This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon Europe Research and Innovation Program under Grant Agreement No. 101060818.