Dr. Nienke van Staaveren is an animal scientist whose research focus is to improve animal health and welfare across the production chain. Her current research is part of the Horizon Europe funded aWISH (Animal Welfare Indicators at Slaughter) project. aWISH aims to evaluate and improve the welfare of meat-producing livestock throughout Europe via automated monitoring of animal-based welfare indicators at the slaughterhouse in order to give feedback and advice on best practices to those responsible for the various stages of production. 

Dr. Nienke van Staaveren completed her M.Sc. in Animal Science at Wageningen University (The Netherlands) and obtained her PhD in Veterinary Medicine from University College Dublin (Ireland) and Teagasc – the Irish Agriculture and Food Development Authority. Her PhD research focused on the validation of tail lesions on the carcass as an indicator of pig welfare on-farm and the development of meat inspection as a pig health and welfare diagnostic tool.

Before coming to Utrecht University, she was a researcher and project manager bridging the Centre for Genetic Improvement of Livestock and the Campbell Centre for the Study of Animal Welfare at the University of Guelph (Canada). She worked on various research projects covering the role of the gut-microbiota-brain axis in feather pecking in laying hens, development of management strategies to reduce injurious pecking in laying hens and turkeys, and applying genomics with a focus on health and welfare to improve the breeding of turkeys and dairy cows.

She has received prestigious awards such as the Universities Federation for Animal Welfare (UFAW) Early Career Animal Welfare Researcher of the Year Award (2022), Marina van Damme Grant incentive prize for talented female Wageningen University & Research alumni (2018), a Mitacs Elevate Postdoctoral Fellowship (2017), and the Academic Mentorship Award (2018) and Outstanding Service Award (2022) from the University of Guelph.