Defining and ensuring animal welfare in pig production: an overview Paul H. Hemsworth, University of Melbourne, Australia

It is widely recognized that most of the animals that society uses can suffer. As argued by Mellor et al. (2009), in using these animals for our purposes we exercise varying degrees of control over the quality and duration of their lives, which provides us therefore with the opportunity to manage them humanely. Moreover, using them for our own purposes,

not theirs, requires us to do so. Therefore, we have an ethical ‘duty of care’ towards the animals in our control and this translates into a practical obligation to keep their welfare at acceptable levels.