Research on animal health and welfare in organic farming - a literature review

Organic standards aim at good livestock health and welfare. A literature. search on organic animal health and welfare was performed in October-November 2001 to investigate how well these aims compare with reality, and to see what areas have been researched. The search also made it apparent that national and historical differences in organic standards and in the way organic farming is understood must be considered when comparing results from different studies. The reasons for this are further discussed. Only 22 peer-reviewed papers were found in the search, mainly dealing with dairy cattle health and parasitology. Ten were comparative studies. In addition, two overviews were found. No papers focused on welfare issues other than health. The small number of papers published is not surprising in light of. the development of organic farming and its philosophy. For example, organic researchers have been more interested in solving practical problems than publishing papers. However, this makes it impossible to draw general conclusions regarding the-health and welfare of organic livestock. None of the published articles found indications that health and welfare are worse in organic than in conventional livestock farming, with the exception of parasite-related diseases. A cautious conclusion based on this material is that except for parasite-related diseases, health and welfare in organic herds are the same as or better than in conventional herds. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.