Canada's Maple Leaf Foods phase out gestation crates
Canada's largest pork processor is phasing out "sow gestation stalls" - small steel cages used to confine pigs during pregnancy - a week after its largest U.S. rival made the same move.
Maple Leaf Foods Inc. said the move to group pens will take place over 10 years and apply only to pigs raised in company-owned plants, not those it buys from other farmers.
Consumers will have no way of knowing whether the food on their tables came from a Maple Leaf farm or an independent producer, a company spokesperson acknowledged.
"We're in the very early stages of this process," said Jeanette Jones, Maple Leaf's director of communications.
"There's a lot more work to be done."
http://www.thestar.com/article/176954