Pigs are highly intelligent, emotionally complex animals whose cognitive sophistication creates special obligations for farmers and consumers.
The intelligence of pigs creates a specific welfare problem: the more cognitively complex a species, the more damage is done by depriving it of the conditions needed for cognitive engagement, social interaction, and exploratory behaviour. A bored, frustrated pig confined in a barren pen is not merely physically uncomfortable — it is experiencing a form of psychological suffering that its intelligence makes more acute, not less. The welfare case for enrichment, space, and social complexity in pig husbandry is both scientifically strong and morally urgent.