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Better Pork
February 2017
9
LABEL
CLAIMS
example of the variety of those offered by different farms
and producers from which consumers may choose.
Another growing and popular label claim concerns the
housing of pigs, particularly their ability to access the
outdoors or freely move about.
Label claims such as “free range” or “pigs raised outside”
fall under this category.
Katie MacDonald, specialist in pork production systems
and the pork value chain, noted in a phone interview that
free-range pig farming is generally niche farming. It is not
necessarily appropriate for some commodity hogs which
would sunburn if they spent too much time outside.
Within the labels of free range or raised outside, there is
also some disparity between what those terms imply.
Mary Jane Quinn, former manager of communications
and consumer marketing at Ontario Pork, said in an e-mail
that Ontario Pork is often asked if its pork is free range.
But “this is a phrase that has very little standards or
regulations around it.”
MacDonald said that sometimes the free-range or
raised-outside label claims mean that pigs were allowed
outside on mud or on grass and that some farmers reduced
the herd size so that the pigs raised outside had continued
Heather Ferguson is the value chain manager for
True Foods, a governance company that is part of the
Grand Valley Fortifiers group of companies.