Transportation of pigs and its impact on animal welfare and meat production

Abstract

When trying to generate good productive and reproductive performance in swine livestock production, animal welfare is a transversal axis of great importance. The transportation phase is an essential step in swine production that affects meat quality and productivity. It is necessary to know the factors that may be affecting it, such as cargo density, duration of the journey, and vibration generated in the truck, floors, walls, and internal divisions, which favor stress situations in pigs. In these animals, when exposed to lack of food and water, an unfamiliar environment, with little space, and subjected to different methods of handling, there are increased losses in carcass weight due to injuries, death, and defective meat products, such as pale, soft, and exudative meat, or, conversely, tough, dry, and dark meat. It is necessary to create new evaluation and monitoring systems in the transportation of pigs, in order to reduce mortality and damage to carcass with interventions from animal welfare.