Supermarket adopts animal welfar

Consumers concerned about the past life of their meats are about to get clarity from one chain of organic grocery stores.

Whole Foods Market Inc., a U.S.-based retailer that operates the country’s largest chain of natural and organic food supermarkets, is extending an innovative animal welfare labelling program to its six Canadian stores this week. Rolled out earlier this year across the United States, the labels on all chicken, beef and pork sold at Whole Foods tell consumers exactly how the animals were reared.

Motivating the retailer is the fact that food savvy consumers are increasingly interested in on-farm conditions, propelled by closer relationships with farmers established through booming local food movements and the popularity of movies such as Food Inc., a 2008 documentary examination of corporate farming in the United States that garnered mass audiences.

“We know through consumers surveys that for over a decade there has been growing concern about how animals are raised for food,” said Miyun Park, executive director of Global Animal Partnership, a multinational non-profit that developed the standards used by the standards used by Whole Foods. “Polling in the U.S. shows this clearly,” she said, adding that one recent study indicates that 97 per cent of respondents agree that animals deserve protection from harm and exploitation.

Whether consumers are ready to pay more to give animals better living standards, though, is an open question.

Don Mills, vice-president of Local Foods Plus, a Canadian food change organization that certifies farms and processors based on criteria that include animal welfare stipulations, said the effort to educate buyers, ranging from chefs to large institutions that added welfare practices at a cost, is constant.

“That education has to be passed along to the eaters,” he said. “Farmers, like everyone else, are trying to respond to the market. They will give you the sort of food you want. It has to be paid for, of course.”

Economics figures prominently in the explanation of the current status of industrial animal welfare. As consumption of meat and eggs has grown, inflating demand for animal products, so have efficiencies in production systems designed to churn out protein consistently at the lowest cost possible with little regard for animals’ holistic state of well-being.

Instead of roaming on farms that resemble natural habitats, most agricultural animals are kept in barn stalls and on feedlots designed for uniform growth, fattening and fast market readiness. Confined environments restrict certain natural behaviours (pigs love to root through muck) and can cause stress that leads to new, negative behaviours (cannibalism) which, in turn, require physical modifications, such as removing pigs’ teeth or tails to deter biting.

In these scenarios, animals are rarely anesthetized. There is much research and debate over how much pain the animals experience during tail-docking or teeth-removal. What is clear, according to a Report of the Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production, is that livestock comfort in the modern food system has become a secondary concern.

Few national laws address animal welfare. Instead of pursuing legislative change, welfare advocates backed by a growing body of science have made headway by establishing relationships with major retailers who are attuned to consumers’ growing interest in the matter (much like their counterparts in the arena of seafood sustainability). Fast food chains McDonalds, Burger King and Chipotle have all begun marketing welfare-related procurement decisions that range from using cage-free eggs to more humane methods of slaughter.

Whole Foods is the first mass supermarket to adopt animal welfare standards for meat. Products from the chain’s suppliers are colour-coded shades of orange, yellow or green that correspond with a tiered, five-step rating program that reflects farmers’ progression along a welfare spectrum. The chain refuses to carry meat from vendors who do not at least qualify for the bottom rung of the program.

While requirements vary by species, at step one, the first level in the program, all farmers must refrain from using antibiotics, growth hormones and animal by-products in their feed; they must also refrain from physically altering their livestock in ways that are common in conventional agriculture (trimming beaks, docking tails, removing teeth). To progress upward in the rating system, farms are ranked on everything from the space animals are allotted to the amount of time they spend outdoors and the distance to slaughter destination.

For animal welfare advocates there are a host of hot-button issues that crop up on industrial farms. Here’s a look at the top touchstones:

Dairy Cattle: Confinement. Lack of access to pastures and selective breeding for cows with a higher production efficiency has led to a host of digestive, skin, skeletal and reproductive and hoof problems.

Beef Cattle: Antibiotics. To expedite growth and prevent diseases that spread easily in the close confinement of feed lots, beef cattle are routinely fed diets laced with antibiotics.

Laying hens: Cage confinement. The amount of space allotted to each bird is perhaps the most controversial issue in industrial agriculture. Laying hens like to roost and dust-bathe; wire cages are blamed for restricting this natural behaviour and causing stress.

Swine: Confinement, tail docking and tooth-clipping. Pigs are busy animals and love rooting through muck. Confined indoors on cement floors, they can become frustrated and have been known to bite each others’ faces and tails. Tail-docking and tooth-clipping are common solutions, but without anesthetic.

Source: A Report of the Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production; Local Food Plus

The 5-step animal welfare rating program at Whole Foods Market

For animal advocates there are a host of hot-button issues

Supermarket adopts animal welfare standards for meat in Canada