Certified Animal Welfare Audits for Farms: Part 3 – Certified Programs

Contact: Jeannine Schweihofer<grobbelj@msu.edu>, Michigan State University Extension -

Updated from an original article written by Tina Conklin, Michigan State University Extension.

Part 3 in preparing for a Certified Animal Welfare audit for your farm looks at where you can go as a producer or a consumer to get more information about available audits.

This is the third article in a series regarding Certified Animal Welfare Farm audits, brought to you by Michigan State University Extension. Here producers and consumers will find information regarding some of the different certification programs available for Animal Welfare standards on farms. This is a summary of available programs and this article is not meant to say that one certification program is better than any other.

  • Animal Welfare Approved
    • Available for dairy, eggs, chicken, goose, duck, turkey, beef, bison, rabbit lamb, goat and pork. 
    • Administered by the non-profit Animal Welfare Institute.
  • Certified Humane
    • Available for diary, eggs, chicken, turkey, beef, veal, lamb, goat and pork. 
    • Administered by the non-profit Humane Farm Animal Care.
  • American Humane Certified
    • Available for dairy, eggs, chicken, turkey, beef, veal, bison, lamb, goat and pork. 
    • Administered by the American Humane Association.
  • Global Animal Partnership
    • Available for chicken, turkey, beef and pork.  
    • Administered by the non-profit Global Animal Partnership.  
    • This is an animal welfare rating as opposed to a humane certification program.  Producers are certified on a six-tier scale, from Step 1 to Step 5+.
  • American Grassfed
    • Available for dairy, beef, lamb and goat.  
    • Administered by the American Grassfed association.  
  • Food Alliance Certified
    • Available for dairy, eggs, chicken, beef, lamb and pork. 
    • This is a non-profit sustainable agriculture program that supports “safe and fair working conditions, humane treatment of animals and good environmental stewardship.” 

This list is not exhaustive however; it does provide a place to begin the search for the right certifier for your farm. As a consumer, it is an opportunity to become more educated about the claims you may find on your packaging, finding the right production method for the things that you desire in your diet.  

Other articles in this series

This article was published by Michigan State University Extension. For more information, visit https://extension.msu.edu. To have a digest of information delivered straight to your email inbox, visit https://extension.msu.edu/newsletters. To contact an expert in your area, visit https://extension.msu.edu/experts, or call 888-MSUE4MI (888-678-3464).

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