Last week scientists from eleven institutions from seven countries met at FiBL to discuss the final outcomes of the CORE Organic project ANIPLAN. ANIPLAN was a 3 year project with the objective of minimizing medicine use in organic dairy herds through animal health and welfare planning.
Mette Vaarst, senior scientist at the University of Aarhus and coordinator of the CORE Organic project, was enthusiastic about the findings, which included the creation of a set of principles for animal health and welfare planning that can be used for future research and for farms.
Michael Walkenhorst, FiBL scientist and partner in ANIPLAN, added that the project also had notable short term intervention success, resulting for instance in a significant reduction in antibiotic use.
Both noted that dialogue with farmers is extremely important and was a strength of the project and also contributed to producing essential guidelines for communication about animal health and welfare promotion.
Details of the project can be found at http://aniplan.coreportal.org/.
Further information
Contact
- FiBL contact: Michael Walkenhorst
- Project coordinator: Mette Vaarst