Tierschutz first? Wie wichtig sind unterschiedliche Nachhaltigkeitsaspekte in der Nutztierhaltung: Ein systematischer Vergleich

Livestock production has been subjected to public criticism for many years. In particular, the intensive housing conditions are criticized by large parts of the public and also need improvement from a scientific point of view. However, there is evidence that livestock production does not only affect animal welfare, but also the environment, climate and human health. This leads to a number of trade-offs that challenge a sustainable and future-oriented transformation of the sector. In particular, improving animal welfare is a complex task where potential trade-offs need to be identified and evaluated from a societal perspective to address the increasing loss of acceptance. Therefore, this study investigates how important different aspects of livestock production are for German citizens in a conflict situation using best–worst scaling and ranking in an online survey. In addition to assessing aspects of different target categories such as animal welfare, environmental and climate protection or human health, individual sub-aspects within animal welfare are also considered for 4 animal species: fattening pigs, dairy cows, broilers and laying hens. Results show that, regardless of the species or method used, citizens give higher priority to animal welfare and human health than to other sustainability aspects, and in particular to product attributes. Regarding animal welfare, good housing conditions, good supply of food and water and good health conditions were the most important aspects. The results provide a valuable contribution to the development of policy frameworks aimed at a sustainable and socially acceptable transformation of current livestock production.