Powerpoint presentation

Running head: ANIMAL WELFARE 1

ANIMAL WELFARE 2

Animal Welfare Semen Technology

Da Vielle Vinson

DeVry University

Week 7 revision

Animal welfare entails the relationship that persons have with the animals and the obligation that they must ensure that the animals under their care undergo humane treatment and responsibly. The animal welfare act is structured because the people take care of the animals, and the animals take care of them. Semen technology is semen with X and Y bearing sperm to create offspring of the preferred sex, either male or female. The tech is known as "Beltsville sperm sexing technology." The semen technology is used by most of the entities for faster genetic improvement in cattle. It positively contributes to animal welfare since its cuts down about 21 years of the seven generations that would be accounted for to produce the animals' desired products to three generations in one year.

Additionally, there are various platforms and guidelines established to mend the standards and well-being of animals, which also work towards eradicating animal abuse. Abuse in most cases is regarded as the deliberate act of cruelty such as torture and beating animals. There are five domains in animal welfare: nutrition, environment, health, behaviours, and mental state. Every animal deserves to be comfortable as it enjoys the benefits of each of the domains. Ethical and welfare deliberations are not often ordered to develop new breeds of production or companion animals. The breeding is mainly focused on production. However, consumers' enlightenment on animal welfare issues leads to decreased demand for meat with negative effects associated with certain production traits in farm animals.

However, animal welfare applies to all the entities that deal with the animals, such as the farmers, ranchers, animal trainers, and veterinarians, among other entities that live and work with these animals. The business that deals with the animals must implement animal welfare rules, practices, and programs to guarantee the convenience of awesome food, animal healthcare, proper conduct, and socialization. Some business entities have gone ahead to employ scientific methods on the animals to measure cortisol levels in the animals' blood to measures their stress heights. When the best applies are in place, and the animals appear to be calm and fit, animal welfare delivered is usually satisfactory.

Furthermore, Aristotle compares the animals to humans being arguing that they have a determination and that ‘telos’ is usual and inflexible. The animals need to be treated with respect and care by their master of owners. In his arguments, Aristotle delivers convenient and demanding frameworks of animal farm ethics that go beyond the negative notions of welfare as liberty for harms (Grumett et al., 2019). He adds that good stock persons need to promote their animals with care and ensure that their essentials, wants, and longings are fulfilled. The stock person also needs to have accumulative wisdom of the ways and the expected behaviours of his farmed animals. Through the knowledge, the person would know what to feed his stock and identify ailments early enough and provide treatment to the animals. The wellness acts are beneficial to the animals and the farmer to ensure that they get the expected quality and quantity of farm products.

In addition, on the course of reproduction, there are various limitations associated with the welfare of the animals. The limitations include the fertility rates. The fertility rates in the farm animals significantly impacts the performance. The welfare of the animals includes their health needs which are significantly influenced by reproduction. Semen technologies such as artificial inseminations positively impact the animals, such as minimizing the risks of disease transmission and selecting specific behavioural properties. The technology helps the animals to have a stronger genetic development that they have resistance to some illnesses that are prone among the breed (Ritter et al., 2019). It also helps develop other beneficial properties such as better productivity about their breed and body wellness. However, there are limitations linked to the technology, such as the oestrus expression.

However, oestrus manipulation can spark negative attitudes among some consumers on certain products whereby they perceive naturalness as an essential aspect of animal welfare. However, there are various benefits associated with estrous synchronizations, such as allowing the females to conceive earlier in the breeding season, especially for the beef cattle (Abraham et al., 2017). In other cases, AI and embryo transfer help reduce the time and the labour of detecting the oestrus. However, these benefits are tied to the human being for reproductive purposes.

Moreover, the consumers' attitude of the effects of the intensified production systems affects their consumption of the products. A high number of customers do not believe that these products match the perceived qualities, thus opting for other substitute products. Consumers are attracted to quality attributes, and they are more confident and likely to purchase welfare-friendly products. The consumers are attracted by the transparency of the product's value chain, which intensified and influenced the farmers to engage in more quality and friendly habits concerning their animals, especially on what the animal's consumer (Alonso et al., 2020). The customers look for healthier, safe, environment-friendly, and more hygienic products.

As a result of the consumers' changing perception, the farmers and the businessmen need to be informed for them to adopt sustainable and socially responsible practices at their farms. These ethical practices are instrumental for them to reach a socially ethical approval and maintain public credibility. After all, a business reputation influences the success of a business. A positive business reputation attracts more customers and encourages the customers to maintain their loyalty and a broader range of products. However, a negative reputation ruins the success of the business in terms of revenues and customers. However, it starts with the reputation that they portray on their animals, such as the environment of their farm animals, the products they consume, and their health. A good example is a company tie to excessive use of antibiotics to promote the growth and prevention of illnesses on healthy animals. It is a common tread identified in industrial farming, and the companies caught up in the trend lose their customers and revenues massively.

Therefore, most of the developed countries are meeting the required expectations on animal welfare. However, some challenges continue to hinder animal welfare in veterinary practice. Veterinary ethics is a scheme of ethical principles that apply the standards and decrees in veterinary medicine. The ethics entail the practical application under the clinical environment. Veterinary has an educational focus with ethics being taught to the professionals, and the ethical frameworks are employed in different cases. Veterinary practice demands ethical reasoning depending on the circumstances and the issues of concern(Hernandez et al., 2018). Insufficient mature ethical reasoning leads to failure in caring for the animals, which results in failure of duty in caring for the animals, leading to poor animal welfare outcomes.

References

Abraham, M. C., de Verdier, K., Båge, R., & Morrell, J. M. (2017). Semen collection methods in alpacas. Veterinary Record, 180(25), 613–614. https://doi.org/10.1136/vr.104074

Alonso, M. E., González-Montaña, J. R., &Lomillos, J. M. (2020). Consumers’ Concerns and Perceptions of Farm Animal Welfare. Animals, 10(3), 385. https://doi.org/10.3390/ani10030385

Grumett, D. (2019). Aristotle’s Ethics and Farm Animal Welfare. Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics, 32(2), 321–333. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10806-019-09776-1

Hernandez, E., Fawcett, A., Brouwer, E., Rau, J., & Turner, P. (2018). Speaking Up: Veterinary Ethical Responsibilities and Animal Welfare Issues in Everyday Practice. Animals, 8(1), 15. https://doi.org/10.3390/ani8010015

Ritter, C., Beaver, A., & von Keyserlingk, M. A. G. (2019). The complex relationship between welfare and reproduction in cattle. Reproduction in Domestic Animals, 54, 29–37. https://doi.org/10.1111/rda.13464