Monitoring animal welfare on commercial broiler farms in Sweden

This paper describes the background to an animal welfare programme for broi lers which has been developed by the Swedish Poultry Meat Association toget her with production advisors, veterinarians and representatives from the Sw edish National Board of Agriculture. The programme aims to improve the gene ral standard of broiler rearing and takes into consideration housing facili ties, equipment, management and stockmanship. Using a set protocol, an eval uation is made of the livestock environment, the standard of the buildings and equipment, and management practices on each broiler farm. A monitoring programme for food-pad dermatitis, linked to the welfare programme, is full y described. The design of the broiler welfare programme is discussed, with special emphasis on the results that are fed back to the farmer, the effec ts of intervention and the importance of follow-up.