Precision livestock farming and animal welfare

Precision Livestock Farming (PLF) is often perceived as an instrumentation of animals in order to make more profitable ‘industrial farms’. By contrast, one could argue that animal welfare can be better ensured if they are closely monitored with state of the art technology, enabling rapid feedback by the farmer. We will start from the main dimensions of animal welfare, as defined in the Welfare Quality® approach, to analyse how PLF can help to...