Key Certainties and Uncertainties in Animal Health and Welfare

In celebrating 100 years of efforts to improve animal health and welfare, the Organisation also stands at the crossroads of an ever-evolving landscape of change that directly and indirectly affects animal health and welfare. This publication, the first of its kind to be published by WOAH, highlights a set of key changes that are influencing and shaping today’s decisions and tomorrow’s outcomes – presented here as ‘change cards’. Among the emerging changes presented here are those that participants assessed as ‘key uncertainties’ during sense-making workshops for the 100th Anniversary Foresight Project. Such changes were considered ‘key uncertainties’ because while their impacts might prove significantly disruptive or transformative, it is difficult to assess the probability and full range of those impacts over time. Their potential for disruption suggests that decision-makers should
begin contingency planning to anticipate potential impacts and consequences, monitor their evolution and devise adaptive or mitigative actions.