European agricultural policy

animals Article Exploratory Survey on European Consumer and Stakeholder Attitudes towards Alternatives for Surgical Castration of Piglets Marijke Aluwé 1, *, Evert Heyrman 1 , João M. Almeida 2 , Jakub Babol 3 , Gianni Battacone…

animals Article Exploratory Survey on European Consumer and Stakeholder Attitudes towards Alternatives for Surgical Castration of Piglets Marijke Aluwé 1, *, Evert Heyrman 1 , João M. Almeida 2 , Jakub Babol 3 , Gianni Battacone…

ifferences in good-quality meat; they want to be sure that it comes production strategies can be observed not only between from animals raised in good welfare conditions (Suther- countries but also within them. Belgium, Germany, Nor- land et al., 2012; Czech et al., 2022). The surgical cas- way, Romania, and Ukraine also use immunocastration tration of piglets evokes significant emotional responses as an alternative solution; however, it is a rarely chosen due to the stress and pain they experience (Mancini et method in this respect (Aluwé et al., 2020). In Norway, al., 2017). Surgical castration is regulated by the Coun- legal regulations prohibiting surgical castration without cil Directive 2008/120/EC of 18 December 2008 laying pain-relieving measures were implemented as early as in down the minimum standards for the protection of pigs. 2002. In Denmark, similar regulations were introduced In 2010, meetings were held between European repre- in 2009, and in Sweden in 2016. In recent years, Ger- sentatives from the pork production chain, resulting in many and France have followed suit, establishing bans the development of The European Declaration on Alter- on performing the procedure without anesthesia starting natives to Surgical Castration of Pigs. It stipulated that in 2021. This variation in the timing of implementing re- starting from 1 January 2012, surgical castration would spective regulations highlights the different pace at which only be performed using anesthetics and/or analgesics. European countries address this issue (Lin-Schilstra and Furthermore, from 1 January 2018, the procedure was to Ingenbleek, 2021). 202 A. Zalewska et al. Bearing the above in mind, the aim of this review arti- Bonneau and Weiler (2019), indicators of pain include cle is to