Does Smart farming improve animal welfare?

“Smart” or “precision” farming has transformed crop cultivation, but its application to animal farming has raised social concerns because of its possible adverse effects on animal welfare under Smart agriculture.

With rising public concern for animal welfare worldwide, some people see the organization gains offered by the new technique as direct intimidation to the animals themselves, permitting producers to acquire “more for less” in the absorption of profit under IoT solutions.

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Factors:

  • Others see significant welfare advantages through life-long health monitoring, individual care delivery, and environmental conditions optimization under Smart farming. The solution to whether Smart farming enhances or damages animal welfare is suitable depends on three main factors under IoT solutions.
  • Firstly, much will lean on how welfare is defined and the scope to which politicians, scientists, farmers, and public members can agree on what welfare aids and so come to a standard view on how to conclude how it is influenced by technology under Smart farming.
  • Defining welfare as a mixture of good health and what the animals themselves want gives a comprehensive and animal-centered way forward under Smart farming. It is also directly adjusted for computer identification of welfare under IoT solutions.
  • A second critical feature will be whether high welfare standards are prioritized within Smart farming systems under IoT solutions. It will be necessary to develop computer innovations that recognize welfare to the contentment of the public and farmers and build good interest in Smart systems’ control and decision-making under Smart farming.
  • A social appraisal will only be possible when the new techniques are more widely positioned on trading farms, and their complete social, environmental, financial, and welfare connections become apparent under Smart farming.

Can Smart farming furnish its promised benefits to animal welfare?

  • Smart livestock farming promises greater efficiency to farmers and higher animal welfare standards under Smart agriculture.
  • Despite the significant progress that has been made since the paper was published, precision livestock farming still needs to catch up to plant crop production in its petition of precision technology in many sections under IoT solutions.
  • Many of its most ambitious features – such as automated welfare assessment – are still in development and have yet to prove their value when applied to farming conditions under Smart farming.
  • As a solution, many farmers, particularly those in the poultry zone, are yet to be satisfied that Smart farming approaches are right for them or that they provide any better outcomes than be achieved without the help of costly technology under IoT solutions.
  • Only when there is extensive commercial application and proof of the outcomes of Smart farming in operation will we be able to conclude its accurate effects under IoT solutions.
  • These solutions must include whether it reduces waste, decreases disease incidence, and consequently decreases or enhances medicine use.
  • What accomplishes it has on the environment, the people operating with animals, and whether it permits farmers to make a living under Smart farming.

Facts:

  • Economic features will be decisive. Farmers who see trading advantages will invest in Smart farming equipment. This emphasis on profit and efficiency causes the most concern for animal welfare under IoT solutions.
  • There is a common faith that animal welfare conflicts with systematic farming because its benefits are unreal and derive from ethics and moral principles or what the public sees as a “good.”
  • However, animal welfare has direct financial advantages too, and once these are recognized, animal welfare is less likely to be seen as in dispute with efficient farming under IoT solutions.
  • It is, therefore, worth acknowledging the possible results of Smart farming on the two elements of animal welfare examined in this article in the aspect of their financial suggestions under IoT solutions.
  • The effect of precision farming on the first element of animal welfare – good health – is likely to be positive and financially beneficial under Smart agriculture. By having greater control over environmental situations that Smart farming provides, animals can be kept in optimal cases for their health, making them less appropriate to decrease.
  • Or require medication or to be a source of illness to each other or humans under IoT solutions.
  • A broiler farm with ten houses could produce as many as 3 million birds annually, so even a 1% saving in death could be financially decisive for poultry producers under Smart farming.
  • If the structured environment possible with precision farming also decreased downgrades due to leg and foot injuries, breast blisters, and other symptoms of ill health, this could be an additional financial gain under IoT solutions. Making sure that birds raise at an even rate is another reflection of economic connections since supermarkets often demand birds of the same weight under Smart farming.