Who Is PAACO?

( Click link above for a fact sheet on PAACO)

PAACO BACKGROUND

Successful livestock, dairy and poultry producers and their related industry partners provide sound animal care on commercial farms and harvest plants. Most animal and meat producer organizations have guidelines that are consistent with sound science and a consideration of economic realities.

The National Council of Chain Restaurants (NCCR) and the Food Marketing Institute (FMI) have asked producer groups to develop and send species-specific guidelines for their review. After consideration of adoption of all or part of these guidelines, the NCCR and FMI have an expectation that plant and on-farm audits of farm animal welfare will begin.

The National Pork Board (NPB) has developed their Swine Welfare Assurance Program (SWAP) as a tool to be used by pork producers to perform internal assessments of farm animal care. SWAP is not an audit, but in all likelihood SWAP components could serve as a basis for the development of an audit to demonstrate compliance with animal welfare principles. The American Meat Institute (AMI) Foundation has developed extensive, science-based practices for their industry and documented it in the “Recommended Animal Handling Guidelines and Audit Guide (2005 Edition)” which is to be utilized for their industry segment.

The dairy industry has developed a Dairy Quality Assurance (DQA) Program that includes animal welfare as a significant component. Poultry (egg and meat birds) and beef industries have an interest in on-farm animal welfare assessments. United Egg Producers (UEP) has developed an association with ARPAS to train auditors and conduct on-farm audits. The beef industry is organizing its guidelines and audit programs.

Professional animal science and veterinary organizations have direct interest in and expertise in farm animal welfare. Among the species-specific veterinarian organizations are the American Association of Swine Veterinarians (AASV), the American Association of Bovine Practitioners (AABP) and the American Association of Avian Pathologists. In addition, the research, teaching and extension expertise of the members of The Federation of Animal Science Societies (FASS) and The American Registry of Professional Animal Scientists (ARPAS) bring immense resources to the topic of animal care and handling. These organizations have supported and contributed their expertise to pork, dairy, beef and avian health, quality and care assurance programs.

The process by which harvest plant and on-farm animal welfare auditors are qualified, trained and certified continues to be developed. Many groups require the plant and on-farm auditors and audit firms to have specific qualifications, experience and abilities. FASS, ARPAS, AABP, AAAP and AASV are professional, independent, science-based groups that have come together to initiate training and certification for on-farm and harvest plant auditors.