Mandatory welfare labelling on animal products would enable consumers to make informed choices and create market incentives for welfare improvement, but has faced persistent industry resistance.
Food labelling reform is a high-leverage welfare policy intervention because it creates transparency that enables consumer choice and creates competitive incentives for producers to improve. Currently, the majority of intensively produced animal products carry no information about the conditions in which animals were raised. Mandatory method of production labelling - similar to the successful egg labelling system - would change this. The business case for industry resistance is clear: transparency reduces the competitive advantage of low-cost, low-welfare production. The welfare case for labelling is equally clear: information enables choice, choice enables markets for welfare, and markets for welfare create investment in welfare improvement. Sustained advocacy for mandatory labelling is a high-return welfare policy investment.