Trade-offs

From Down on the Farm by Waldemar Ingdahl:

For some the good life is the so-called "natural" one. This can become difficult to obtain since many domestic animals don't exist in a wild state any longer and are specifically bred for their productive attributes, which makes them very hard to transfer to any type of agriculture other than an industrialized one.

Another interpretation of the good animal life is about physiological balance. The easiest way to measure the welfare of the animals is the mortality degree of the livestock, because other measures are more difficult to implement rationally.

For example, organic egg production systems, for example, have a significantly higher mortality rate for chickens than the cage system. In the organic systems diseases are more easily spread through feathers and excrement (i.e. salmonella, which is endemic to poultry) and chicken cannibalism is more difficult to prevent. The risk of injuries increases when beak trimming is banned, and the hens can hurt each other more easily in their pecking-order fights. The use of extensive preventive medication is extremely important for poultry (including antibiotics), but it isn't allowed in organic farming, which leads to coccidiose, a parasitic intestinal infection. The hens may live a more natural life, but succumb in greater numbers to a painful disease.

Still others suggest that a good life for the animals is to avoid pain and other suffering. The important point is if the animals themselves, subjectively, can be said to have a good situation. This isn't always that clear-cut, and requires extensive human interpretation.

Consider that animal rights activists have maintained that cattle should have straw on their floors. Sounds sensible enough. The TV images of cattle stumbling about on naked concrete floors in their own feces moved the hearts of millions. But from an environmental point of view these conditions have advantages, since they are easier to rinse, and enable the collection of the enormous quantities of feces in centralized septic tanks.

Free ranging sows rummage the earth, and that quickly peels away the grass layer from the soil. Without the grass layer the pig feces goes directly down in the ground, over-fertilizing it. Many sows get their snouts pierced with a ring, which is painful in itself, but also brings the pig pain when it tries to rummage. The pig's natural behavior is thus stopped through pain, with an unnatural intervention, in order to protect the environment. Free ranging pigs are mainly present in organic agriculture -- go figure.