The Welfare Footprint Framework quantifies animal experiences so that welfare can be considered alongside economic, environmental, and health outcomes in public decisions.
Our estimates, methods, and tools help policymakers compare legislative proposals, assess welfare improvements per dollar spent, set targets, track progress, and evaluate welfare provisions in trade.
WFI provides scientific evidence to inform these decisions. We do not recommend policies, endorse regulations, or take institutional positions on legislation, subsidies, or trade.
The metric
Intensity and duration are estimated by synthesizing behavioural, neurophysiological, pharmacological and evolutionary evidence against defined criteria, and are expressed as probabilities across four intensity categories rather than a single value. Prevalence comes from epidemiological evidence; where data are thin, it is given as an uncertainty interval. Each parameter is treated as a hypothesis with a stated uncertainty, and is updated as evidence accumulates. The main limitations, mostly sparse data on timing and prevalence, are set out in the FAQ. The framework does not prescribe whether to improve current systems or move away from them. It makes the welfare consequences of each option comparable. The method is the same for every estimate. What varies is the scope (species, system, life stages and region), and each estimate states its boundaries.
Applications
Regulatory impact assessment
Welfare Footprint estimates can quantify the welfare consequences of a proposed rule—for example, the hours of pain at each intensity that an intervention is expected to prevent across the affected population.
Regulatory economists have begun incorporating these estimates into welfare valuation. WFI provides the welfare quantities; monetary values and weights assigned to different intensities remain choices for the analyst.
Comparing policy options
Policy analysis often involves trade-offs between welfare, cost, production, and environmental impact. Welfare Footprint estimates allow these consequences to be examined together.
A European environmental assessment agency has used the framework and broiler estimates in agricultural modelling and trade-off analysis. Our broiler research illustrates how the welfare gains from slower-growing breeds can be assessed alongside changes in production costs and emissions.
Analyses should also consider how a rule changes production practices, productivity, and the number of animals affected.
Evaluating standards
Housing requirements, slaughter and stunning methods, transport limits, and restrictions on painful procedures can be assessed in terms of their expected welfare consequences.
Informing legislation
Quantitative welfare evidence can help legislators describe the harms a proposal addresses and assess its expected benefits.
The framework has been used in technical opinions and presentations informing welfare legislation and a welfare-labelling proposal. WFI’s contribution is the underlying scientific assessment.
Enforcement and legal proceedings
A Pain-Track describes the estimated duration and intensity of an animal’s pain, with its evidence structured, assumptions, and uncertainty. Enforcement bodies are starting to use this approach in animal cruelty cases, as it makes the scientific evidence needed to demonstrate intense and prolonged pain, as often required in legislation, transparent.
These assessments can inform questions about animal experiences. Whether the evidence meets a statutory threshold or establishes a legal violation is a matter for the relevant legal authorities.
Other potential applications
Comparable welfare estimates could also inform public procurement, agricultural subsidies, national welfare targets, international standards, and welfare reporting within sustainability frameworks.
In trade and market access, they could contribute to assessments of equivalence, import requirements, and criteria for species that may be traded or kept.
Working with WFI
Our published methods and estimates are designed for independent use. Direct collaboration is selective, with priority given to work that advances the framework and its adoption.
Use the evidence. Incorporate published estimates into policy analysis, standards, or legal proceedings. For a bespoke assessment: Certification is planned for 2027.
Develop expertise. Train analysts or enforcement staff through workshops and certification. A Costa Rican agency has used this training to support work on animal cruelty cases. We also consider requests for scientific briefings and presentations on our published estimates.
Support research. Fund the development of estimates and methods relevant to public decisions. Funding can accelerate research; it does not determine its findings.
Share your needs. Tell us which estimates would inform your decisions and how you are using our work.
Tools
Explore our tools for preliminary welfare analysis, with expert review required before policy or legal use.
Using the evidence
- Check applicability. Confirm that the species, production system, region, and other relevant conditions match your context.
- Match the claim to the assessment. State which animals and systems were compared, the experiences assessed, and the period covered. A finding about a specific practice does not establish the overall welfare performance of a product, company, or supply chain.
- Retain uncertainty. Preserve the published ranges, assumptions, and qualifications rather than selecting a single value without justification.
- Identify the source. Link to the relevant assessment and cite its authors, version, and date.
- Distinguish evidence from endorsement. Citing a Welfare Footprint estimate does not imply WFI certification or endorsement. Do not use our name or logo in ways that suggest a product has been certified or approved by the Institute.
- Credit the work. Welfare Footprint data and reports are available under a Creative Commons Attribution licence.
Our scientific remit
WFI provides welfare estimates, methods, tools, and selected analyses within the Welfare Footprint Framework. We can explain the scientific basis and limitations of our work, but do not offer legal conclusions or endorse policy choices.
Where a question falls outside our existing estimates or methodological expertise, researchers specialising in the relevant species, practice, or system may be better placed to advise.
Have you used the Welfare Footprint Framework or WFI's estimates? Give us your testimony.