ABSTRACT
This chapter will first consider animal welfare in the context of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), looking at the reasons explaining the absence of this concept from the goals, as well as at the potential to mainstream animal welfare in the implementation of the SDGs, providing examples related to SDG 8. The analysis will then switch to the regional level and focus on the European Union (EU), where there has been a growing crystallisation around the normative inclusion of animal welfare in the implementation of the SDGs. As trade policy is considered a strong channel of norm diffusion for the EU, the chapter will describe the extent to which this normative approach on animal welfare and the SDGs has been adopted in the field of EU trade policy, both from a legal perspective—in Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) or in strategy documents—and from a practical one—in the implementation of FTAs. It will then look at three case studies of norm diffusion efforts around animal welfare, which will allow us to draw conclusions and open further reflections on the tools the EU has at its disposal to promote norms through trade policy.
