Environmental enrichment and welfare in animal production

Authors

  • Gisele Dela Ricci Universidade de São Paulo
  • Cristiane Gonçalves Titto Universidade de São Paulo
  • Rafael Teixeira de Sousa Universidade de São Paulo

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5965/223811711632017324

Keywords:

ruminants, swine, poultry, stress, animal behavior.

Abstract

Animal welfare is among the main demands of consumers, who are increasingly critical of the quality of life within the environment, which requires the use of static conducts in systems for animal production. From this perspective, the objective of this study was to describe the importance of environmental enrichment in promoting improved welfare in animal production. Environmental enrichment has as main characteristic to reduce stimuli that generate stressful responses and allow the presentation of natural behavior, avoiding the appearance of stereotyped behaviors in confined animals. Natural behavior was defined as the one in which the animal tends to perform freely, by bringing pleasure or promoting good physiological functioning. While animal welfare is related to housing conditions such as bioclimatology and plant biophysics, it can be measured from physiological and behavioral assessments. Stress is seen as a set of intense and prolonged physiological reactions that result in imbalance of homeostasis, with important and irreversible effects on the animals. Thus, it is concluded that the use of environmental enrichment can greatly contribute to the reduction of stressors, improving animal welfare in production systems.

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Author Biographies

Gisele Dela Ricci, Universidade de São Paulo

Zootecnista pela UNESP. Mestre em Ciencia Animal pela USP.

Atualmente é doutoranda pela USP em Zootecnia e Produtividade Animal.

Cristiane Gonçalves Titto, Universidade de São Paulo

Zootecnista, mestre e doutorada pela USP.

Atualmente é professora na Faculdade de Zootecnia e Engenharia de alimentos- USP- Pirassununga

Rafael Teixeira de Sousa, Universidade de São Paulo

Zootecnista e mestre. Atualmente é doutorando pela Universidade de São Paulo

Published

2017-09-25

How to Cite

RICCI, Gisele Dela; TITTO, Cristiane Gonçalves; DE SOUSA, Rafael Teixeira. Environmental enrichment and welfare in animal production. Revista de Ciências Agroveterinárias, Lages, v. 16, n. 3, p. 324–331, 2017. DOI: 10.5965/223811711632017324. Disponível em: https://revistas.udesc.br/index.php/agroveterinaria/article/view/223811711632017324. Acesso em: 7 dec. 2024.

Issue

Section

Review

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