Other Labels

Aside from the labels outlined in previous sections, the following are some other labels that are common on animal products:

Certified:

Meat that has been stamped with this label has been “evaluated” by the U.S. Department of Agriculture “for class, grade, or other quality characteristics.”

Grass-Fed:

This label is used on beef to indicate that the cow ate a diet of grass—what they would naturally eat—instead of the unnatural and unhealthy grain diets that most cows are fed in order to fatten them up before slaughter. Although cows surely suffer less when they’re allowed to eat grass (grain diets can lead to liver abscesses, constant digestive pain, and death), grass-fed cows are still subjected to mutilations without the use of painkillers and are often killed in the same slaughterhouses as cows from factory farms, and they threaten fragile ecosystems by eating all the grass and other plants and pounding down the earth in the areas where they are kept.

Natural:

Use of this label is permitted if the product contains “no artificial ingredients or added color and is only minimally processed.” According to farmer Amiel Cooper, “Natural is a virtually meaningless word [when it is applied to animal products].”³²

No Antibiotics:

This label can be used on beef and poultry products, provided that the producer supplies “sufficient documentation … that the animals were raised without antibiotics.”³³

No Hormones:

This label applies only to beef. Since hormones are not supposed to be given to pigs or chickens, pork and poultry products cannot legally be tagged with this label without the disclaimer “Federal regulations prohibit the use of hormones.”

None of these labels regulate the welfare of animals in any way.

Read more.

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³² Colin.
³³ Food Safety and Inspection Service, “Meat and Poultry Labeling Terms,” U.S. Department of Agriculture, Aug. 2003.