INTERPORC: Leadership in animal welfare
Over time, this has shaped a work model that is based on modern, precision livestock farming that shines especially in one of the parameters most in demand by today's consumers: animal welfare.
One of the main reasons is that the sector has been given its own seal that is even more demanding than the law itself: B+ Animal Welfare Commitment from INTERPORC, an organization fully aligned with the improvement of animal welfare and that promotes initiatives that develop it within the sector.
The first thing to highlight is that the B+ Animal Welfare Commitment seal is voluntary, so joining it shows the absolute conviction of a company to guarantee the best possible treatment for its animals at each link in the chain.
This is because the content of its INTERPORC Animal Welfare Spain (IAWS) Technical Regulation leads companies that adopt it to install a holistic vision of animal welfare in their way of working. From the life of the animal on the farm, to its transportation and slaughter in the slaughterhouse, all processes and phases of the pigs' lives are analyzed and parameterized to guarantee maximum welfare conditions.
That is, it requires an additional and voluntary effort to be made in key phases such as traceability, feeding, sanitary conditions, biosecurity, animal health, food safety and animal housing.
IAWS was born from scientific reality, since it was written by a Scientific Committee of experts in animal welfare, which in turn followed the guidelines set in this matter by the World Organization for Animal Health (WHO).
The WHOA describes animal well-being as the physical and mental state of an animal in relation to the conditions in which it lives and with respect to five freedoms: freedom from hunger, thirst and malnutrition; of fear and anguish; physical and thermal discomfort; of pain, injury and illness; and to manifest natural behavior.
IAWS imposes conditions that lead to full compliance with respect for those freedoms. Furthermore, for absolute rigor, the Regulation establishes that verification of compliance must be carried out by a certifying company that is outside the sector and is accredited by the National Accreditation Entity of Spain, an organization that, in turn, accredits the Regulation itself.
These are data that also allow INTERPORC to bring confidence and transparency to the consumer. Those products that bear the seal certify that they have been manufactured with the highest animal welfare standards in the world. From a sectoral point of view, the will of Spain's white pork sector to self-impose standards that go even beyond what the law requires is reaffirmed.
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