You see tons of animal pics on social media. Most of the time they are happy with their owners or playing with kids. But hey, what about other animals that did not have that much luck and became victims of deforestation or illegal hunting.
Maybe you heard of World Animal Protection which is an animal welfare organisation. They take care of cases when animals are treated badly and create awareness about animal protection most of the time in home animals but wild and exotic animals as well.
What is animal welfare ?
Animal welfare describes the level of quality life that animal has. How good animals are able to cope with surroundings that global warming brings every day.
Animal welfare then focuses on how wild and home animals are affected by human interaction. If they get proper protection and treatment they need.
This also includes taking care of all aspects of animal well being. In this article we will discuss five main domains. These Animal welfare specifics should be at the very core of every human when interacting with animals.
Five domains of animal welfare
Behaviour – this comes down to how animals are treated when engaging with the environment. Can animals play, bond, forage and explore ? Or are those factors narrowed in some way ?
Health – Factors that give animals good health conditions. Avoiding disease, injury and or good level of fitness.
Environment – factors that provide proper comfort like temperature, space, substrate, air and predictability.
Nutrition – these are the factors that give animals good access to sufficient, varied, and clean food and water.
Mental state – Help to present animals with positive situations in the previous four domains, their mental state o should benefit from mostly positive states, such as, comfort, vitality while reducing negative states such as fear, hunger.
Why is animal welfare so important not only for animals ?
Animal welfare is crucially important, because there are so many species around the world that suffer which creates ongoing diss balance in ecosystems. Animals simply lack good food, medicine, entertainment, and scientific advancement.
The main slogan behind this is: “Each animal deserves to have a good life where they enjoy the benefits of the Five Domains.
How does World Animal Protection work to improve animal welfare?
World Animal Protection has a multi-pronged approach to improving the lives of animals. The programs include protecting animals in the wild and creating a better quality of life for animals in farming.
Around the world, they work with corporations to implement robust animal welfare policies ending the use of wild animals for entertainment and the exotic pet trade.
They also encourage people to reduce the amount of cruelly produced factory-farmed meat they eat and work with meat suppliers to implement higher animal welfare practices, eliminating some of the worst cruelties farmed animals face today.
What can you do to protect animals ?
- speak out against any injustice to animals you encounter.
- Recycle: when choosing packaged goods, choose those with little or no plastic wrap.
- Pick the trash wherever you go, especially in or near water,
- Do not spray pesticides and chemicals on lawns.
- Garden for wildlife, plant perennial gardens instead of grass. They attract birds, bees, and butterflies.
- Buy from local businesses
- Buy Fair trade products
