Vasco Grilo🔸 answers Does anyone have up to date estimates on the most effective charities helping chickens?

[Vasco Grilo🔸]

Hi Omnizoid,

I have recently posted a cost-effectiveness analysis on corporate campaigns for chicken welfare. I used Saulius Šimčikas’ estimates from 2019, Open Philanthropy’s adjustment from 2023, and some others I added in my own analysis. I conclude broiler welfare and cage-free campaigns are:

• 168 and 462 times as cost-effective as GiveWell’s top charities, i.e., way more.

• 0.261 % and 0.718 % as cost-effective as Shrimp Welfare Project’s Humane Slaughter Initiative, i.e., way less.

[Mo Putera]

I thought it’d be helpful to improve comparability with LChamberlain’s answer on Sinergia Animal by being a bit more object-level:

• Saulius previously estimated that a dollar donated to support corporate cage-free commitments historically helped free somewhere between 9 to 120 hens from cages, with a mean of 42 hens; since their average lifespan is 1.1–1.5 years that’s 54 years of improved life per dollar. Vasco then discounts this by −80% going forward to incorporate Open Phil’s thinking that “we’ve covered many of the strongest opportunities in this space, and we think that current marginal opportunities are considerably weaker” to get ~8.4 hens freed per dollar donated

• From LChamberlain’s answer, ACE estimates Sinergia’s work to free 53.5 hens per dollar, which is >6x Vasco’s estimate for (presumably) cage-free campaigns in general and slightly above Saulius’ average

I’d be curious to understand how much of this ~6x difference is a ‘best charity implementing an intervention’ thing (which I’m guessing is what Omnizoid asked for? Akin to how cost per person treated is the most important consideration for MH treatment interventions), and how much is due to differences in methodology, considerations included/​excluded (e.g. OP’s “current marginal opportunities are considerably weaker”), inputs, etc.

[Vasco Grilo🔸]

Thanks, Mo! I had actually made that comparison, but had not yet seen LChamberlain’s answer.

Trusting these [Animal Charity Evaluator’s] numbers, your [Sinergia’s] cage-free campaigns are very cost-effective. Each hen lives for “60 to 80 weeks”, i.e. 1.34 years (= (60 + 80)/​2*7/​365.25), so your cage-free campaigns improve 71.0 hen-yeas per $ (= 53*1.34). This is 6.57 (= 71.0/​10.8) times the 10.8 hen-years per $ implied by Open Philanthropy’s adjustment of Saulius Šimčikas’ estimate, and respects a cost-effectiveness of 24.2 DALY/​$ (= 6.57*3.69).

[Mo Putera]

I missed that, thanks for pointing it out Vasco! And always appreciate the thoroughness and transparency of your estimates.