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Governance with close links to farmers
Michael has been a member of the Board of Directors of Danish Crown Amba since 2017. Being part of a cooperative and the community has always been important to Michael, who owns the farm Tilsbæk near Slangerup in North Zealand, Denmark. The farm serves as a link between rural and urban communities and engaging in dialogue and bringing forward new perspectives to the board is important for him. Michael is also passionate about animal welfare and is a member of the Danish Animal Ethics Council and the Veterinary Committee in the Danish Agriculture & Food Council.
Focused attention to animal welfare
Our Policy for Animal Welfare
Our Policy for Animal Welfare is part of our sustainability strategy, and it reinforces our commitment to animal welfare in general. The policy outlines our position on animal welfare in the supply chain, including aspects like routine confinement, transportation, humane slaughtering, use of antibiotics and growth promoters, as well as animal welfare management and partnerships. We will regularly review our animal welfare policy in collaboration with relevant stakeholders.
Explore the policy here

Target

We want to be ranked as Tier 2 in the 2023 Business Benchmark for Farm Animal Welfare (BBFAW) Report.

SDGs

We support target 2.4 by promoting sustainable food production systems and implementing resilient agricultural practices.

Concepts that care

We have a number of concepts and brands that deliver products with particularly good animal welfare. These include the Danish Antonius and Bornholmergrisen, Free Range Pigs and Cattle, Dansk Kalv, Beef Cattle and the Polish Together into the Future concepts.

In addition, our ‘Dansk Kalv’ products on the Danish market have been awarded two out of three stars in the Danish state welfare label Better Animal Welfare.

Explore our products with a sustainable profile

Under controlled conditions

In Denmark, Sweden and Germany, our control process for animal welfare with three steps:

  • Self-checks, which are carried out by specially trained farm and abattoir staff.
  • Veterinary controls with state employed veterinarians monitoring the entire process from rearing of the animals at the farms to inspections of individual animals at the abattoir.
  • And unannounced external controls performed by relevant authorities and customers. The controls include mortality, proper use of hospital pens for animals and the use of medicines, which are monitored closely at the farms and are always subject to approval by the affiliated veterinarians.
Gentle and short transport
In Denmark, Germany and Sweden, we are at an advanced stage of development in terms of safe, gentle and short animal transport from farm to abattoir. All our vehicles have modern ventilation equipment, deck heights, compartment divisions, bedding, cover, requirements on rules for stocking density and a requirement that drivers are trained in transporting live animals.

Certification at the abattoirs

At all our abattoirs, trained staff handle livestock. To ensure a common approach, we have developed a tool to manage our certification programme for animal welfare at our abattoirs. The tool can clarify the various steps that abattoirs must take to comply with additional relevant standards and certification programmes. These include the Global Red Meat Standard (GRMS), which is a certification programme developed by Agriculture & Food Council. This programme works together with its abattoir members and the Danish Meat Research Institute to provide transparency in animal welfare, quality, food safety and hygiene at abattoirs.

Ranking of animal welfare

In 2021 we were ranked at the second highest level in The Business Benchmark for Farm Animal Welfare (BBFAW), while in 2022 we were ranked at a lower level, i.e., Tier 3. The lower ranking is partly due to changed assessment requirements and the fact that we do not have reported adequately. We will of course address this and strengthen our reporting practices. Going forward, our goal is to achieve the second highest ranking, tier 2, by 2023