Luc Mounier – Teacher-researcher and coordinator of the animal welfare chair at VetAgro Sup (Lyon) (testimonial from the “Animal welfare: Science to inform public policy” dossier -2021)
“A veterinary surgeon by training, I did a thesis at INRAE from 2002 to 2005 on the welfare of bull calves. The following year, I joined the veterinary school in Lyon where I work on animal welfare. I’m convinced that scientists have a role to play in sharing a ‘one health’ approach to animal welfare. Scientific mediation is essential for forging links between farmers, vets, researchers, associations, the general public and so on. In 2016, I coordinated an animal welfare MOOC, followed by the publication of three awareness-raising books by Éditions Quæ. In 2018, we created a chair in animal welfare at VetAgro Sup with 3 missions: scientific production, training and information, and promoting exchanges between stakeholders. We have quite distinct and coordinated positions with the National Reference Centre for the BEA. Alain Boissy is a member of our steering committee and I have represented the veterinary schools on the steering committee of the CNR-BEA since its creation in 2017. Animal welfare is really becoming part of people’s consciousness, practices and public policies.”
Testimonial from our thematic dossier
Thematic dossier
Animal welfare: science to inform public policy
Although animal welfare is now a pressing concern in our society, the issue first came to the fore in the 1960s as a reaction to the intensive farming conditions developed to optimise practices and increase economic profitability at the expense of animals. It was in the 1980s, under the impetus of a few pioneering researchers, that the issue of animal welfare began to be taken into account at INRAE.
This dossier retraces the major stages in the Institute’s investment in this area, through Research
and in support of related public policies.
