Universal Declaration on Animal Welfare
proposed inter-governmental agreement on animal rights
The Universal Declaration on Animal Welfare (UDAW) is a proposed inter-governmental agreement to recognise that animals are sentient, to prevent cruelty and reduce suffering, and to promote standards on the welfare of animals such as farm animals, companion animals, animals in scientific research, draught animals, wildlife and animals in recreation.
It was proposed that the declaration would be adopted by the United Nations. If endorsed by the UN (as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was) the UDAW would be a non-binding set of principles that acknowledge the importance of the sentience of animals and human responsibilities towards them. The principles were designed to encourage and enable national governments to introduce and improve animal protection legislation and initiatives.
History
The UDAW was conceived in 2000 by a group of animal welfare organizations including World Animal Protection (formerly the World Society for the Protection of Animals), which now acts as its Secretariat. It is supported by a planning group including Compassion in World Farming, Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA), the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) and the Humane Society of the United States.
In 2003 in the Philippines, the Manila Conference on Animal Welfare was attended by 19 government delegations with the European Council, United States and Saipan as observers. A foundation text with core principles for a UDAW was agreed.
In 2005, the UDAW inter-governmental steering committee was formed and representatives of the governments of Kenya, India, Costa Rica, the Czech Republic and the Philippines agreed to champion the initiative.
They led a group of governments whose officials have stated support in the following years, including Cambodia, Fiji, Latvia, Lithuania, New Zealand, Poland, Slovenia, Tanzania and the United Kingdom.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Universal Declaration on Animal Welfare” is proposed inter-governmental agreement on animal rights. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Universal, Declaration and Animal, not as a finished interpretation.
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The phrase “proposed inter-governmental agreement on animal rights” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
Datasets, specimens, observations and peer-reviewed methods provide the appropriate test for the technical claims summarized here. The source revision retrieved here is dated Nov 18, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q1570800. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2000, 2003 and 2005.
A general summary may omit uncertainty, sample limits or methodological disagreement that is explicit in the technical record. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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This entry incorporates text from “Universal Declaration on Animal Welfare” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.