Source: Rita Jane Gabbett, MEATINGPLACE, 7/29/14


The American Veterinary Medical Association passed a resolution that updates its policy on sow housing to explicitly recommend housing that allows sows to assume "normal postures" and "express normal patterns of behavior."

The resolution is important, as AVMA has been considered an industry expert opinion in the contentious debate over the use of gestation stalls. That animal husbandry practice was standard in the industry in previous decades, but has in recent years begun to be phased out by some major producers.

The new AVMA resolution does not directly oppose gestation stall use, but does add language that addresses quantity of space and warns against conditions that could produce "distress" or "fear" in the animals. Those who oppose gestation stall use have often pointed to the fact that the sows are not able to turn around within the stall and that those conditions distress them. However, those who support gestation stall use have argued that aggressive boss sows in open sow housing situations could cause fear in smaller sows.       

The resolution now states:
Pregnant sows are kept in a variety of housing systems. Sow housing and management systems should:
• Provide every animal access to appropriate food and water
• Promote good air quality and allow proper sanitation
• Protect sows from environmental extremes
• Reduce exposure to hazards poor conditions that result in injuries, pain, distress, fear or disease
• Facilitate the observation of individual sows to assess their welfare
• Provide sows with adequate quality and quantity of space that allows sows to assume normal postures and express normal patterns of behavior.

There are advantages and disadvantages to any sow housing system and the benefits and harms to the animals of each should be considered by weighing scientific evidence and veterinary professional judgment. For example, while gestation stalls systems minimize aggression and injury, reduce competition, and allow individual feeding and nutritional management, they restrict normal behavioral expression. Group housing systems are less restrictive but could lead to increased lameness and undesirable social behaviors such as aggression and competition for resources (e.g. feed, water, space to lie down).  

The AVMA encourages ongoing research to better understand and meet the welfare needs of gestating sows. Appropriate and ongoing training for people handling and working with pregnant sows is critical to ensure that they are able to provide and promote good welfare within the management system being used.

AVMA spokesman Michael San Filippo told Meatingplace the new wording was “passed with 99 percent support.”

History
The original policy on Pregnant Sow Housing was submitted via resolution and approved by the AVMA House of Delegates in 2002. That policy was superseded by a more detailed policy in 2005. In 2011, a streamlined version of the 2005 policy was approved.

During meetings in 2012 and 2013 AVMA’s Animal Welfare Committee (AWC) discussed recent decisions of pork processors, distributors and retailers, and actions taken by state and international governments and agencies regarding the use of gestation stalls.

In 2013 the AWC approved a motion to re-open the policy for review.

“The AWC believes the suggested revisions are supported by current science and practical experience with housing systems,” the committee stated in a note attached to the revised language, which was then approved by the AVMA executive board and the membership.

NPPC comments
The National Pork Producers Council issued the following statement about the AVMA's updated policy:
"NPPC and America’s pork producers agree with the AVMA that sow housing and management systems should, among other things, reduce animals’ expose to hazards or conditions that could result in injuries, pain, distress, fear or disease; that they should provide sows with adequate quality and quantity of space; that there are advantages and disadvantages to any sow housing system and that the benefits and harms to the animals of each system should be considered by weighing scientific evidence and veterinary professional judgment; and that ongoing research is need to better understand and meet the welfare needs of gestating sows."

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