Percepções e ações humanas sobre o bem-estar animal nos sistemas de produção

Abstract

Animal welfare has been gaining attention from society, especially regarding its applicability to scientific and productive contexts. However, the scarcity of information on the subject does not only apply to consumers, but also those who are directly or indirectly involved with an animal. Thus, the objective of this work was to carry out a survey on the degree of knowledge of Brazilians in relation to animal welfare, evaluate attitudes towards this information, and analyze how the media interfere in this process. For this purpose, an online survey was conducted through the application of a structured questionnaire with 24 rating questions through the Google Forms application, which collected data from 237 consumers, 63.7% of respondents belonging to the female gender, indicating that women have a greater involvement on issues related to animals. It was concluded that the perception of consumers about animal welfare in relation to products of animal origin is strongly influenced by the education of these people and their access to the internet. Consumers are willing to pay up to 5% more for products that guarantee the welfare of animals, from breeding to slaughter, regardless of their social class; however, there are barriers to purchase these products, such as the lack of information available to the consumer, before and at the time of purchase, and the low availability of the products.