Each year, under a federal disaster assistance program called the Livestock Indemnity Program (LIP), the US Department of Agriculture shells out tens of millions of dollars to compensate livestock producers for the injuries and/or deaths...

The USDA has recently released its updated food labeling guideline for animal-raising claims made on meat and poultry products, three years after taking public comments on proposed changes. Disappointingly, the department failed to address a...

In February, AWI and a coalition of animal groups sued the USDA for its decision to deny a petition asking the department to ban the cruel practice of slaughtering nonambulatory disabled (NAD) pigs. NAD animals...

The perils of overseas animal transport were recently underscored when 21 cows perished on a barge traveling from Honolulu to Kauai. While the animals were inspected at the port—per Hawaii regulations for preventing the transmission...

The California referendum to prohibit housing sows in gestation crates, hens in battery cages, and veal calves in crates by 2015 passed in November by a nearly two-to-one margin. AWI supported the measure because of...

In late November, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) revoked its ban on extra-label antibiotics used in rearing farm animals, particularly in intensive systems. The ban was proposed last summer as an effort to curtail...

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) exempted all agribusiness in December—no matter how industrialized, no matter the animal product produced—from having to declare noxious emissions produced by animal waste. The EPA says that reporting these emissions...

The second global conference on Animal Welfare was convened by the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) last year in Cairo, Egypt, from October 20 to 22. The conference had a dual purpose: assess progress...

According to a recent report published by the University of British Columbia in Canada, 90 percent of the global small fish catch—which includes anchovies, sardines and mackerel—is processed into fish meal and fish oil and...

No single federal law explicitly addresses the treatment of animals raised for human consumption on farms in the United States. Due to growing public concern, many states have taken action to improve the welfare of...