Selective breeding has created livestock with welfare-compromising characteristics. A growing movement seeks to reverse these trends by breeding for health, longevity, and welfare alongside productivity.
Livestock genetics is one of the highest-leverage welfare interventions available. Genetic selection determines baseline health, longevity, and physiological limits of commercial animals. When selection pressure overwhelmingly favours production traits, welfare-related traits are inadvertently selected against — resulting in animals prone to metabolic disease, lameness, and reproductive failure. Welfare-positive genetics programmes prioritise health, longevity, and disease resistance alongside production, using genomic tools to identify animals that excel across all dimensions.