Bart Sonck

Bart Sonck was born in Ninove, Belgium, in August 2, 1965. He received the Ph.D. degree in agricultural engineering (specialization in agricultural buildings—mechanics and constructions) from Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium, in 1988. From February 1990 to 1999, he worked as a Research Assistant and, since 1999, he has been the Head of the Division at the Department of Mechanisation, Labour, Buildings, Animal Welfare and Environmental Protection, Merelbeke, Belgium, belonging to the Agricultural Research Centre, where he carries out research in the field of labor organization, animal housing, animal behavior, and welfare in relation to animal housing, management, and precision livestock farming in animal husbandry. From 1992 to 1995, he also worked at Wageningen University, Wageningen, The Netherlands, as a Scientific Guest Collaborator on the research that led to his Ph.D. dissertation “Labour Organisation on Robotic Milking Dairy Farms” in 1996. Since June 2000, he has been the Head of the Department of Agricultural Engineering within the Technology and Food Unit of the Institute of Agricultural, Fisheries and Food Research (ILVO), Melle, Belgium, where he supervises the research on mechanization, labor, farm buildings, animal welfare, and environmental protection. Since 2001, he has been Visiting Professor at the Department of Animal Sciences and Aquatic Ecology, Ghent University, where he teaches the courses “agricultural mechanisation” and “animal housing” to the masters of biosciences. Since November 2007, he has been the Head of the Animal Sciences Unit (ILVO).