Pigs are highly motivated to explore, root, and manipulate objects, and provision of appropriate enrichment materials significantly reduces aggression, stereotypies, and welfare problems in housed systems.
Pig enrichment research is among the most clearly actionable findings in farm animal welfare science. The welfare benefits of providing appropriate rooting and manipulable materials are robust and consistent across studies. Pigs given straw or equivalent materials show dramatically lower rates of abnormal behaviors. The legal requirement for enrichment in the EU has driven some improvement, but enforcement gaps allow minimal compliance with materials that do not adequately satisfy rooting motivation. Consumer demand for genuinely enriched housing, backed by credible certification, is the primary mechanism for driving improvement above legal minimums.