Guidance

Goats: on-farm welfare

How to keep farmed goats, and your responsibilities for their health, housing and feed.

• From: Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs
• Published: 15 August 2023

Applies to England

Documents

Code of recommendations for the welfare of livestock: goats

HTML

Code of recommendations for the welfare of livestock: goats

PDF, 121 KB, 11 pages

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Details

The legislation covering on-farm welfare for goats is:

• the Animal Welfare Act 2006
• the Welfare of Farmed Animals (England) Regulations 2007
• the Mutilations (Permitted Procedures) (England) Regulations 2007

The code of practice for the welfare of goats provides guidance on how to comply with this legislation. It’s intended to help all those who care for goats to practise good standards of stockmanship to safeguard goat welfare.

You and any staff working with goats must read, understand and have access to this code. Welfare codes are not law, but if you do not follow them they can be used as evidence in court to show breaches of legislation.

Some of the references to legislation in the codes are out of date. You should refer to the animal welfare legislation listed above and relevant wider legislation as needed.

For more information on legislation and codes of practice for other species, see farm animals: looking after their welfare.

Published 15 August 2023