Animal Welfare Approved, the nation’s leading certification label for family farmers raising their animals with high welfare standards, is hosting Jeanette Orrey, the United Kingdom’s famous “Dinner Lady” (that would be a lunch lady on this side of the pond) the week of January 11th. Orrey is a leader in the U.K.’s efforts to provide school lunches made of fresh, local organic food. She will be visiting with school officials, farmers and proponents of healthy school lunches in New York City, Baltimore, Maryland and Arlington, Virginia.

Accompanying Orrey on her journey will be Animal Welfare Approved staff, Bill Telepan, chef/owner of Manhattan’s Telepan Restaurant, and Nancy Easton, a New York City teacher for 20 years. Telepan is a long-time Animal Welfare Approved supporter and a board member of Wellness in the Schools. Wellness in the Schools is a grassroots organization that promotes children’s environmental health, nutrition and fitness within the New York City public schools. Easton co-founded Wellness in the Schools and serves on its board. The New York City school system serves approximately 1.1 million students.

Yet another article highlights the importance of consumer engagement in food labeling.

According to LancasterOnline.com’s Mary Beth Schweigert, lack of oversight in National Organic Program has created a “chasm between consumer expectations and actual industry practices.” Ms. Schwigert notes the challenges that the NOP, now in its twelfth year, faces in terms of its dual mission to protect agriculture while simultaneously protecting the consumer.

The NOP has drawn significant criticism on its lax pasture requirements – 80,000 public comments to be exact. However, even adequate standards are only as good as the enforcement behind them. Schwigert reports a startlingly low number of citations in the first seven years of the program – only $20,000 for three fraudulent operators in a $23 billion U.S. organic food industry.

National Organic Coalition (an industry watchdog group) policy coordinator Liana Hoodes responded to this issue, explaining that strong national organic regulations are worthless without consistent oversight and enforcement. She added, “It will either clean up its act or get surpassed by many other labels.”

For most of human history, our relationship with cattle has been about the foods they produce: milk, meat and cheese. Today, a new bovine “product” has captured our interest and may indeed affect the future production of the others. This new product is gas.

Cow burps are the most recent in the list of accused contributors to global warming from the livestock sector. However, a simple measurement of methane production does not tell the whole story. A new report by the Soil Association reevaluates greenhouse gas production in agriculture, taking into account the grazing system – not just the “end product.”

This controversy erupted in recent years as figures emerged about agriculture’s contribution to greenhouse gas emissions. As we discussed in our November 16, 2009 blog, “Beware of Bad Science,” grassfed cattle actually produce fewer emissions than those finished in feedlots, simply because of the carbon sequestration in their pasture-based systems. The new Soil Association report confirms this and adds new data to support the position.

We wish you and your families a happy holiday season.

As another season of farming and caring for their animals and land draws to a close, we would like to offer a sincere thank you to the visionary farmers in our program who provide us with better food raised a better way. We are only as strong as our farmers and they are an amazing group!

To the people who support them, and to everyone working to create a better food system for the mutual benefit of our shared environment, farm animals, and ultimately for ourselves, we offer our thanks for your dedication and encouragement.

Facebook is a forum for us to communicate with our friends and supporters and sometimes to engage in respectful debate. We are pleased that so many of you have become our “fans.”

It is becoming increasingly difficult not to want to delete posts that are insulting or hurtful to the farmers in our program, many of whom are also fans of our Facebook page.

Part of what we do on Facebook is share facts that will allow consumers to make informed choices. We are a program promoting high-welfare meat, dairy and eggs. We have a strong following of people who choose to consume these products, but want to assure that the animals were raised with positive welfare. These consumers understand that these products are safer, healthier and ultimately better for the farmers, animals and the environment.

In response to many ongoing requests asking whether Animal Welfare Approved products are available in Whole Foods Market stores, the answer is YES!

This holiday season, in addition to purchasing your AWA meat directly from the farm, CSA, farmers’ markets, co-ops, or buying clubs, you can shop at more than 130 Whole Foods Market locations and find Animal Welfare Approved grassfed beef and pastured pork products.

While Animal Welfare Approved farmers supply numerous Whole Foods Market locations, typically it has been difficult for consumers to find Animal Welfare Approved products at these stores because most AWA products will lack the familiar AWA label. And since Whole Foods Market stores offer a variety of meat products from a host of different sources, consumers need to ask for Animal Welfare Approved products by the specific farm or farm group where the animals were raised on pasture or range.

In a major move for the Obama administration, the US Department of Justice (Antitrust Division) and the US Department of Agriculture have opened an investigation into whether any illegal monopolies exist among the dominant agricultural companies. The focus is primarily on three sectors: seed companies, beef packing and dairy.

With a history of exemption from antitrust regulation the industry as a whole has become extremely concentrated. For instance, the the top four beefpacking companies currently control 83.5% of the market. As part of this investigation, a series of public workshops will be held across the country. Read on for dates and locations, as well as information about submitting comments online or by mail.

We at Animal Welfare Approved are privileged to work with some of the most amazing farmers in the world. They are leading the transition back to pasture-based farming, and pioneering a new agriculture that seeks to heal our planet while providing healthy, nutritious food to all.

This year, as you prepare for a holiday that celebrates the bountiful harvest farmers have provided, we ask you to take a moment to thank a family farmer for the good food that nourishes you. Join us in celebrating National Farm-City Week by using the comments section of this blog to tell us about the farms that will fill your Thanksgiving table this holiday season and throughout the year, and why they matter to you.

Take a moment to write a few words of thanks to your neighbor farmers, farmers from your farmer’s market, your CSA provider, and any family farmer you appreciate.

In a recent post we discussed the ruling currently under construction at the USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) which would allow certain state-inspected slaughter plants to perform federal inspections on meat and poultry. The comment period has been extended, and we invite anyone who has an interest in this to add your two cents to the discussion (read full post for instructions). This ruling could have tremendous implications for livestock farmers using independent, state-inspected plants who are now limited to selling product within state lines, and could dramatically expand their marketing capabilities. Cooperative inspection has the potential not only to benefit independent farmers and slaughter plants, but could have positive animal welfare implications through reduced transport time.

On November 5, a “news article” appeared word-for-word across countless livestock-related websites – including Drovers, Dairy Herd, Cattle Network, AgWired, DairyLine, Beef Magazine, and so on. No journalist is cited as the author on any of the sites where it is published, an indication that the piece was not a ”news article” at all but a press release issued by an unidentified source.

Entitled “Environmentally Friendly Food Myths Debunked,” the news article provided coverage of a presentation given by Dr. Jude Capper at the 71st Cornell Nutrition Conference in October 2009. Her presentation reported findings from a recent paper co-authored with R.A. Cady and D.E. Bauman, entitled, “Demystifying the Environmental Sustainability of Food Production.”