Development of a welfare assessment protocol for dromedary camels during road transport

Transporting dromedary camels, like other farm animals, may be stressful and impair their welfare and health. The lack of standardized practices regarding loading and unloading, vehicle design and size, journey duration, and space allowance complicates camel transportation, leading to greater welfare compromise and risk. The study aimed to develop a protocol for assessing the welfare of dromedary camels during road transportation. A group of researchers and experts (n = 10) conducted an extensive literature search and frequent meetings, during which several unstructured expert knowledge elicitation (EKE) sessions were conducted to develop the protocol. The literature search was conducted in Scopus and Web of Science databases; additionally, a snowball search was conducted to locate relevant literature. Overall, 24 articles from the databases, 10 initial articles, and 20 articles from the snowball search were used. Due to limited research on the transportation of dromedary camels, the authors primarily considered studies on the welfare assessment of other species during transport, such as horses, pigs, and ruminants. Accordingly, the checklists were prepared to assess the welfare of dromedary camels at five stages during transportation: before loading (24 indicators), after loading (18 indicators), during the journey (14 indicators), upon arrival (24 indicators), and 1 h after arrival (22 indicators). Additionally, a checklist was prepared to assess the loading and unloading process (28 indicators), the journey, and the vehicle (17 indicators). This is the first protocol to assess the welfare of dromedary camels during road transportation. It uses non-invasive methods and practically applicable welfare measures suitable for field conditions. However, it needs to be applied to refine and validate the proposed animal-based and environmental welfare indicators.