Synergy for preventing damaging behaviour in group housed pigs and chickens

  GroupHouseNet 

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    Feather pecking in chickens
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    Delegates at the 2nd Management Committee in June 2016, in the wonderful city of Belgrade  
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The GroupHouseNet aim is to provide the European livestock industry with innovations in breeding and management for pigs and poultry that are needed for a successful transition to large group housing systems without necessitating painful tail docking and beak trimming. We are an EU funded project (COST Action CA15134) - keep updated on our activities and outputs by following us on Twitter: @grouphousenet1

Final Dessemination Meeting, Paris, December


10th, 2019


The final dissemination meeting for GroupHouseNet will be held in Paris on December 10th 2019. Please send a mail to the Action Chair if you are not on the mail list and would be interested in participating. The main goal will be to summarise knowledge regarding the prevention of damaging behaviour in pigs and laying hens. Further information will be posted here and circulated to the GroupHouseNet mailing list.   

EU commission Animal Welfare meeting: 27-28 Nov 

The European Commission is organising a two day meeting from 27 to 28 November 2018, sharing valuable insights from top EU experts on progress with rearing pigs with intact tails and thus improving their welfare.


The meeting, which will take place at the Commission's Health and Food audit and analysis Directorate in Ireland, will be available via web streaming. The topics presented are especially of interest for industry stakeholders, authorities in EU Member States, researchers, and NGOs interested in the welfare of pigs, as they focus on ongoing work to improve rearing conditions on farms to assist in the phasing out of routine tail-docking of pigs and managing the risk factors relating to tail biting.


The group of expert speakers include pig farmers and industry representative organisations, EU Member State competent authorities, research bodies, NGOs and EU institutions.  Discussions will focus on what has been done, and what remains to be done, to get better solutions for the future. The work of the newly created EU Reference Centre for Animal Welfare, focussing initially on pigs, will also be presented at this meeting.


For details on how to join the meeting, click here!