Degree project: Are we forgetting animal welfare in sustainable development?

The sustainable development goals (SDG) are primarily anthropocentric while billion of farm animals, pets and other animals in the care of human are and will be affected by the paths towards sustainability that we choose. Are you interested in exploring links between animal welfare and sustainable development and how the welfare of animals can be incorporated into frameworks and tools to assess sustainability? 

There is now an opportunity for up to two masters students to work within a collaborative project between the researchers at the Department of Animal Environment and Health (Faculty of Veterinary Medicine and Animal Sciences) and Department of Energy and Technology (Faculty of Natural Resources and Agricultural Sciences).

Our interest is the development of improved methods to include animal welfare in Social Lifecycle Assessments (relating impacts to the products produced). We are also interested in building upon work to address animal welfare within the UN sustainable development goals. These master projects would fit students with a background in either animal husbandry or in environmental assessment or sustainability science and can be written in either English or Swedish.

We will jointly define the project according to your interest in specific animal species and contexts. Below are references to some earlier examples of work in this area, but for further information please contact us.

Linda Keeling and Elin Röös

Examples of previously published work in this area:

• Zira S, Röös E, Ivarsson E, Hoffman R, Rydhmer L (2020) Social life cycle assessment of Swedish organic and conventional pork production. International Journal of Life Cycle Assessment. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11367-020-01811-y
• Keeling, L.J. et al.  (2019). Animal Welfare and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. Frontiers in Veterinary Science, section Animal Behavior and Welfare, 10 October 2019. https://doi.org/10.3389/fvets.2019.00336
• Scherer, L., Tomasik, B., Rueda, O. et al. (2018). Framework for integrating animal welfare into life cycle sustainability assessment. Int J Life Cycle Assess 23, 1476–1490. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11367-017-1420-x