News

Leprino Foods establishes animal care standards

Leprino Foods announced a mandate that its dairy suppliers and farmers comply with a set of animal care standards.  Leprino, one of the largest cheese and dairy food ingredient companies in the world is launching the Leprino Quality Animal Care Program (LQAC).  The initiative works in combination with existing dairy industry standards including the National Dairy Farmers Assuring Responsible Management (FARM) program in the U.S. and the European Red Tractor Program.

 

Among the LQAC requirements:

•             A third-party auditing system to verify compliance
•             Independent third-party on-farm evaluations and herd health assessments
•             Annual employee education and training programs including a signed code of ethics
•             Develop an oversight committee to investigate instances of noncompliance
•             An independent advisory council to guide Leprino in best practice adoption

The new policy is in direct reaction to an undercover video shot at a New Mexico dairy farm which supplied Leprino. Shortly after the video was released by Mercy for Animals in September, Winchester Dairies shut the 3,000-cow dairy down, fired all of the employees and moved the cows to other operations.  The Los Angeles Times says the Chaves County District Attorney’s office is reviewing the evidence for possible criminal charges.

 

 

Based in Denver, Leprino has operations in Colorado, Michigan, California, New Mexico and New York. The company also has facilities in the United Kingdom and Singapore.

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