Farm animal welfare (FAW) concerns have prompted scientific research, development and standard setting (especially in the EU and USA) having ethical, production, economic, social, cultural and trade implications. We meta-analyse the literature on consumer willingness to pay (WTP) for FAW, examining 24 studies reporting 106 estimates of consumer FAW values. Meta-regressions indicate that respondent income and age significantly affect WTP, substantial geographical disparities are unsupported, information provision about farm animal living conditions significantly alters WTP estimates and suggestions that FAW be legislatively required significantly reduce WTP. We conclude that the public good aspect of FAW merits further investigation.

Consumer preferences and willingness-to-pay (WTP) for certain non-market food process attributes were investigated using a choice experiment. Swedish consumers were found to be willing to pay a price premium for the use of mobile abattoirs for cattle but not for broilers. We used two different survey versions, with and without an opt-out alternative. There is no evidence that omission of the opt-out alternative leads to biased choices. In addition, respondents who chose to opt-out were no different from those making trade-offs between attributes. The inclusion of an opt-out alternative has no significant effect on the marginal WTP. Based on estimated distributions of WTP and available cost estimates, the market share for mobile abattoirs is predicted. Here we do find differences between the two survey versions: the version with an opt-out alternative revealed greater unobserved heterogeneity.

This study systematically reviews the peer-reviewed literature on livestock production and food security in urbanizing environments of developing countries to synthesize the existing evidence and identify priorities for future research. Specifically, a systematic literature review was undertaken using PubMed, ISI Web of Science and Scopus databases over the period 1980–2017, resulting in a final number of 72 articles meeting our selection criteria. The results revealed a fragmentation in the literature, which draws from a very small number of studies, and is positioned in widely varied research areas, environments, livestock systems and consumption patterns. With such heterogeneity, drawing generalizations from the literature may be unreachable. Furthermore, the literature is largely qualitative in nature, with very few comprehensive models to capture and integrate empirical evidence. Food security was typically found to be narrowly defined, focusing primarily on interlinks with livestock supply. Considerably less attention has been given to other relevant dimensions of food security, such as accessibility, utilization and stability. Another important finding of relevance to food security is a need to address the “missing middle” in livestock value chains since the literature has customarily concentrated extensively on the two ends of the livestock value chain, i.e., on production and consumption, while widely ignoring other elements and actors along the value chain. A further focus on the interrelationships between livestock production, food security and urbanization in developing countries through a holistic and interdisciplinary approach is recommended. Particularly, future research aiming to understand livestock systems in the context of rapid urbanization should put more emphasis on addressing the full continuum of the livestock value chain and the four dimensions that drive food security in developing countries and how they possibly interrelate.