Relationship EC-AWB

Abstract

Although the function of both the Animal Welfare Body (AWB) and the Ethical Committee (EC) is described in the European, Belgian and regional legislations, there still remains some ambiguity about which entity (AWB and/or EC) has which responsibilities. This can be attributed to several factors, among others that the legislator did not describe whether and how AWB and EC should cooperate, but probably also due to the fact that in Belgium both the EC and the AWB are anchored at the local institutional level.

Some institutions have one more centralized AWB, while in other institutions, each accredited laboratory has its own AWB. The latter could make the interaction between EC and AWB’s more complex.

With these two different AWB-models in mind, we will try to identify ways to facilitate and stimulate the collaboration between both entities and to propose strategies to arrive at a better repartition of tasks.