*Norwood is associate professor of agribusiness, Lusk is professor and Willard Sparks Endowed Chair of Agribusiness and Prickett is research assistant in the department of agricultural economics at Oklahoma State University. Norwood was the principal investigator of the study. Comments and questions can be sent to him at bailey.norwood@okstate.edu; phone (405) 744-9820.

PERHAPS the most contentious and emotional issue in livestock agriculture is that of farm animal welfare. Modern animal production practices are regularly criticized by animal rights groups, defended by livestock industries and studied by scientists.

The animal welfare debate is far more than a war of words. It has led to legislative action and is influencing consumer demand in a way that could profoundly affect agricultural markets.

Victories by animal rights groups are occurring at a rapid pace. For example, citizens in Arizona and Florida recently voted to ban the use of gestation crates, and similar referenda are being planned for other states.

Further, the Farm Animal Stewardship Purchasing Act pending in the House of Representatives would require farmers selling food to government agencies to meet certain animal welfare requirements, one of which might include the absence of animal cages.

In reaction to animal rights groups and consumer concerns, Smithfield Foods is phasing out its use of gestation crates, Burger King will begin buying eggs and pork from cage-free production systems and Wolfgang Puck (a celebrity chef) now makes animal welfare concerns a major determinant in his food purchases.

Food retailers Whole Foods and Wild Oats seek meat suppliers with high animal welfare standards, such as Beeler's Pork. Whole Foods is even developing a new animal-compassionate food label for those people who consider themselves compassionate carnivores.

Traditional livestock industries have responded in different ways. Some industry groups have taken a staunch, defensive approach. They dismiss animal abuse charges on the basis that animal rights activists' ulterior motive is to convert the population to veganism -- against their will, if necessary. 

Other industry groups have responded more proactively. A prime example is the United Egg Producers, which convened an outside, diverse and objective committee to review its animal welfare standards.

The committee made a number of suggestions, one of which was to increase bird cage space from 48 to 67-86 sq. in. per bird. The recommendations were received enthusiastically by the United Egg Producers and are currently being implemented.

The contentious nature of the farm animal welfare debate was clearly illustrated in the House agricultural subcommittee animal welfare hearing on May 11, where animal rights and industry groups lobbied their typical volley of assaults on one another, exhibiting no willingness to compromise.

Noticeably absent in the debate were consumers. There is no larger group of people more affected by farm animal welfare policies and no single group that has been more ignored.

To give consumers a voice, we conducted a nationwide telephone survey of U.S. consumers early this summer. The survey costs were funded by the American Farm Bureau Federation, designed by us and administered by the Bureau for Social Research at Oklahoma State University.

We wish to emphasize that the principal investigator received no personal compensation, and the Farm Bureau allowed Oklahoma State complete control over the survey questions and the computation of survey results. The point here is that there was no industry agenda behind the survey other than the wish to discover what consumers really think. We applaud the Farm Bureau for funding objective research on such a contentious issue.

We asked a representative sample of roughly 1,000 consumers (6,365 households were contacted, and 1,019 agreed to participate in the survey) from every U.S. region and walk of life 48 questions regarding farm animal welfare issues.

The gender, ethnicity, education, age and income profile of the respondents closely resembled that of the U.S. population. Furthermore, the distribution of respondents across urban, suburban and rural areas resembled the actual distribution of U.S. citizens, ensuring that the responses capture the diversity of food preferences that exist nationwide.

In this article, we attempt to summarize the results of the survey, paying particular attention to its implications for public policy and food marketing. These, of course, are our interpretation of the results, and with 48 questions, there is far more information than one article can summarize.

Readers are encouraged to draw their own conclusions after reviewing the survey in full. Interested readers can download the full research report at asp.okstate.edu/baileynorwood/AW2/AW2Main.htm.

Profitability concerns

While farm animal welfare is of the utmost importance to some people, it is unclear how the general public ranks it as a social issue.

To answer this question, respondents were asked a series of questions measuring the importance they place on the following social issues: poverty, health care, food safety, the environment, the financial well-being of U.S. farmers, food prices and the well-being of farm animals.

A statistical analysis was used to assign each issue a number indicating its importance relative to the other issues, where the importance scores must sum up to 100. The results are shown in Table 1.

1. Importance of farm animal welfare as a national issue
Issue	Relative importance
Human poverty	23.95
U.S. health care system	23.03
Food safety	21.75
Environment	13.91
Financial well-being of U.S. farmers	8.16
Food prices	5.06
Well-being of farm animals	4.15
Note: Each number shows the relative importance of each issue, where the numbers are scaled so they sum up to 100. If Issue A's importance rating is twice that of Issue B, then Issue A is deemed to be twice as important.

Notice that farm profitability has an importance score of 8.16, which is almost twice that of farm animal welfare's 4.25. This implies that, for the general public, the financial well-being of U.S. farmers is twice as important as farm animal welfare. For policy, this implies that legislation intending to improve animal welfare is only desirable to the public if it imposes little financial harm to the farm sector.

Food prices were roughly equivalent in importance to farm animal welfare, whereas food safety and the environment dominate people's concerns relative to the other food issues. Issues directly related to human welfare (poverty, health care, food safety) were roughly five times more important than the well-being of farm animals.

Pasture systems

Many in the livestock industries contend that the most important factors concerning animal well-being (besides obvious factors like food and water) are shelter, comfortable temperature and protection from fellow animals. These factors take precedence over outdoor exercise, ability to exhibit normal behaviors, etc.

Do consumers concur? To answer this question, survey respondents were guided through a series of questions to measure which factors they deem most important for ensuring animal welfare.

Nine factors were evaluated, each shown in Table 2. Again, each factor was given a numerical measure of importance, where the measures sum up to 100 across all factors, and the relative value of one factor compared to another reveals its importance to consumers.

Consumers indicated a preference for pasture/outdoor systems of production, rating the ability to exercise outdoors higher than protection from other animals, shelter, comfortable temperatures and comfortable bedding.

Thus, it is little wonder why consumers are appalled at gestation stalls and battery cages. Consumers associate low standards of care with lack of outdoor exercise.

It is worth noting that while consumers indicated that housing chickens in cages and sows in crates is inhumane, informing people that such practices protect animals from hurting one another increased the acceptability of cages significantly.

Another reason people likely disdain cages is that 81% of consumers agree with the statement, "Farm animals have roughly the same ability to feel pain and discomfort as humans." When imagining how they would feel trapped in a gestation crate, they likely project those same feelings onto the sow.

Role of markets

If farm animal welfare concerns exist, can markets adequately address them without government involvement?

Table 2 shows that consumers generally rank animal welfare factors higher than maintaining low food prices. This contradicts Table 1 somewhat and is likely due to the fact that the question in Table 2 forces the respondent to consider animal welfare more carefully.

2. Importance of livestock production practices for promoting farm animal welfare
Farm animal welfare factor	Relative importance
It is important that farm animals ...
Receive ample food and water	38.43
Receive treatment for injury and disease	29.05
Are allowed to exhibit normal behaviors	8.01
Are allowed to exercise outdoors	7.95
Are protected from being harmed by other animals	5.90
Are provided shelter at a comfortable temperature	4.43
Are allowed to socialize with other animals	2.76
Are raised in a way to keep prices low	1.75
Are provided comfortable bedding	1.72
Note: Each number shows the relative importance of each factor, where the numbers are scaled so they sum up to 100. If Factor A's importance rating is twice that of Factor B, then Factor A is deemed to be twice as important.

The growing organic meat and dairy sector (organic foods have requirements concerning animal welfare) and other private labels promoting humane animal treatment show that many consumers will pay higher food prices in exchange for improved animal well-being.

If markets respond to consumer concerns by tailoring food products to meet their preferences, then perhaps agricultural markets can adequately address animal concerns, making welfare legislation unnecessary.

Responses to a number of survey questions suggest that consumers believe markets can address animal welfare concerns.

Of the more than 1,000 survey respondents, 52% believe their personal food choices have a large impact on the well-being of farm animals (only 36% thought it did not).

When asked whether they agree with the statement, "Food companies would voluntarily improve animal welfare, and would advertise as such, if people really wanted it," 32% strongly agreed and 36% agreed. Only 23% strongly disagreed or disagreed with the statement.

Thus, consumers do have faith that their food choices matter and that food companies will provide the products they want. If a group of consumers is concerned about farm animal treatment, they believe food companies will take notice and will target these consumers with specialty, tailored products.

One could interpret this to mean that if products differentiated by enhanced animal care are not sold in the market, this reflects a lack of concern on consumers' part, not food companies.

This result parallels the arguments about the lack of healthy food at fast-food restaurants. While people complain that fast-food burgers and fries are unhealthy, when these restaurants introduce healthy foods like the McLean Burger, they systematically suffer low sales.

The confidence consumers place in markets to produce products consistent with their preferences suggests little need for government involvement. However, while consumers have confidence in markets to respond to consumer demand, they simultaneously support government involvement.

Government involvement

A majority -- 68% -- of respondents believe the government should take an active role in promoting farm animal welfare, and 75% said they would vote for a law in their state requiring farmers to treat their animals better.

If consumers believe markets can address animal welfare concerns, why would they also request government involvement? There are at least two possible explanations.

First, the term "farm animal welfare" can have a number of interpretations. People may interpret it to include basic animal cruelty, such as health neglect and lack of feed, which rarely occurs on for-profit farms. Typically, state or local government agencies enforce laws against animal cruelty, so respondents may consider this a natural function of government.

Second, the survey suggests that compassionate animal treatment is a basic human value, as 95% of respondents agreed with the statement, "It is important to me that animals on farms are well cared for." The laws a government passes reflect the values of its constituency, so respondents may feel it important to codify this value into law, even if it is ultimately unnecessary.

Higher food prices

Some consumers indicated that they will pay higher prices for improved farm animal care. For example, when presented with the statement, "Low meat prices are more important than the well-being of farm animals," 76% of people disagreed.

However, such questions are hypothetical and subject to what we call a social desirability bias. Respondents often give survey administrators answers that they feel creates a good impression, like showing compassion for animals. Since they can express such compassion at no real cost to themselves, they overstate their willingness to pay higher food prices.

One way to mitigate this bias is, instead of asking people how they personally feel about an issue, to ask them how they think the average American feels. While people like to make a good impression of themselves, creating a good impression of others is not so important.

Previous research has revealed that this form of indirect questioning can sometimes provide a better indication of the person's own personal preferences.

Indeed, when presented with the statement, "The average American thinks that low meat prices are more important than the well-being of farm animals," only 24% disagreed. Thus, consumers probably overstate their willingness to pay higher food prices in exchange for better animal treatment.

This calls into question other studies suggesting that 33-55% of consumers will pay a 10% premium on food that is labeled humane (Market Directions, 2006; Rauch and Sharp, 2005).

Other findings

A select few other findings are presented in Table 3.

3. Answers to select farm animal welfare questions
For each of the following statements, do you strongly agree, agree, neither agree nor disagree, disagree, strongly disagree or don't know?
	Strongly	Agree,	Disagree,	Strongly
Statement	agree, %	%	%	disagree, %
Until we learn to significantly reduce human suffering, we should not worry about the well-being of farm animals.	14	14	24	38
Farmers should be compensated if forced to comply with higher farm animal welfare standards.	37	33	12	10
Farmers and food companies put their own profits ahead of treating farm animals humanely.	36	28	12	9
If food companies improve animal welfare, the price of meat will rise.	38	36	10	7
Farm animals raised on small farms have a better life than those raised on corporate farms.	41	28	8	5
Animals raised under higher standards of care will produce safer and better tasting meat.	53	25	6	4
Decisions about animal welfare should be left to experts and should not be based on public opinion.	31	21	16	24
Note: Percentages will not total 100% as some respondents answered "neither agree nor disagree" or "don't know." These percentages have a margin of error of 1-3%.

Individuals believe that farm animal welfare is a concern even in the presence of human suffering. If farmers are forced to increase their production costs to comply with more stringent welfare standards, they should be compensated.

Consumers understand that agriculture is a business, with a majority saying farmers and food companies put their own profits ahead of treating farm animals humanely. A farm that treats animals well but cannot turn profits will not be able to treat animals well for long. Nor are they naive about the relationship between animal welfare and food prices, as a majority understand that animal welfare improvements will raise prices.

Not surprisingly, consumers have a bias against corporate farms.

One question attempted to measure the value of farm animals relative to a human. If a technology were developed that could either eliminate the suffering of one human or more than 11,500 farm animals, most respondents said it should reduce the suffering of the farm animals.

Conversely, if the technology could address the suffering of one human or fewer than 11,500 farm animals, most respondents chose to reduce the suffering of the one human. What does this imply? Simply that for the average American, the suffering of one human is equivalent to the suffering of 11,500 farm animals.

Food safety, food taste and animal welfare are not separate issues, with a large majority of respondents believing meat is safer and better tasting when raised under high welfare standards.

Finally, consumers are mixed over whether animal welfare decisions should be made by experts or public opinion.

The big picture

This nationwide survey of food consumers provides a unique snapshot of Americans' views toward animal welfare issues.

People do care about animal welfare, but they care about farm profitability as well. The most favored outcomes are those that promote animal well-being while preserving the profitability of farms.

The survey provides results both livestock industries and animal rights groups can use in their favor and some that are counter to their agenda. Animal rights groups will no doubt be pleased that consumers strongly prefer animals to have access to outdoors, as it supports their lobbying efforts. Livestock industry groups will likely applaud consumers' confidence in food markets to address farm animal welfare concerns, arguing that government involvement is unnecessary.

Although it is clear that consumers desire government involvement, what type of involvement consumers want is less clear.

Consumers expect improvements in animal welfare to raise prices but to also produce safer, better-tasting food.

Consumers believe human welfare issues to be much more important than animal welfare issues, but they appear to desire progress on the animal welfare front even if human problems can't be immediately solved.

The extent to which consumers are willing to pay for improved animal well-being can only be adequately addressed with more sophisticated studies that involve consumers making choices between real money and real improvements in animal welfare.

We hope these results help articulate what consumers want in terms of the meat and dairy products they consume. The survey was designed to help agriculture measure the extent to which animal production practices are consistent with consumer demand and maybe identify ways it can improve.

We look forward to hearing other groups' comments and interpretations of the survey and urge opposing groups to use the results to better form a consensus and not a platform to fire assaults at one another.

References

Market Directions. 2006. Consumer attitudes about animal welfare: 2004 national public opinion survey. http://www.animalagalliance.org/images/ag_insert/2004_Pub_Op_PR.ppt. Accessed May 7, 2006.

Rauch, A., and J.S. Sharp. 2005. Ohioans' attitudes about animal welfare. Social Responsibility Initiative. Department of Human & Community Resource Development. The Ohio State University. January.