Bon Appetit prioritizes animal welfare with new policy

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Bon Appétit Management Company joined the fight against the use of gestation crates for pork production as a part of what's being called a groundbreaking animal welfare policy.

Long a leader in sustainable practices, food service operator Bon Appétit Management Company announced Tuesday a new slate of animal welfare policies that it publicized in partnership with the Humane Society of the United States.

In what's being called the most comprehensive farm animal welfare policy to date, Bon Appétit said Tuesday it would undertake a number of changes to its supply chain to eliminate pork and eggs that are produced using gestation crates and battery cages.

Bon Appétit has strong ties to Portland and provides food service for many of the region's universities and companies including Intel, Adidas and Mentor Graphics. Bon Appétit's founder and CEO is Fedele Bauccio, a graduate of the University of Portland.

Bon Appétit's new policy includes:

• Requiring that all 3 million pounds of pork it serves annually be produced without gestation crate confinement systems.

• Switching all of its 11 million pre-shelled, or liquid, eggs that it uses annually to come from hens living in cage-free farms. The company already had that requirement for in-shell eggs.

• Complete elimination of foie gras and veal from valves confined in crates.

• More effort to seek out meat, poultry and egg producers with good animal-welfare credibility.

"We are not only raising the minimum standards for what we will buy; we are also making a commitment that by 2015, at least 25 percent of all our meat, poultry, and eggs will meet the highest animal welfare standards, as verified by the independent third parties," Bon Appétit officials said in a blog post that published Tuesday.

“Bon Appétit has turned ‘very good’ into ‘great,’ setting a new high-water mark in the food-service sector,” said Wayne Pacelle, president and CEO of The Humane Society of the United States, in a press release. “Consumers are deeply concerned about animal welfare, and Bon Appétit is responding.”

Bon Appétit's announcement came a week after fast food giant McDonalds announced it would ask its pork suppliers to phase out the use of so-called gestation crates. And earlier in February, Chipotle made waves with its Superbowl ad that brought attention to the inhumane practices of industrialized meat production.

"We’ve been asking the industry to do the right thing, but we can’t wait anymore," said Bon Appétit's Bauccio in a press release. "We have to send the message that these practices are unacceptable. If the supply doesn’t catch up by our deadline, we’ll do what we have to — even if that means cutting back on bacon."

Bauccio served on the Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production from 2006 to 2008.

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