Whether it’s grass-fed beef or air-chilled chicken, you deserve to feel good about the meat you’re buying. For meat and poultry throughout our Meat department, our standards and strong relationships with farmers and ranchers mean we know where the animals were raised. We also care about how animals are raised — and we’ve developed our rigorous standards with their welfare in mind.
What Makes Our Meat Different?
Transparency and traceability to farm or ranch.
No antibiotics, ever.
No added hormones.*
100+ third-party certification animal welfare standards for fresh beef, pork, lamb, chicken, turkey and goat.
Our Baseline Standards
Our baseline requirements for our Meat department are stronger than most anywhere.
Animals must be raised with no antibiotics ever. Sick animals must receive treatment as needed, but meat from antibiotic-treated animals must not be sold at Whole Foods Market.
Animals must be raised with no added hormones* through feed, injections, implants or any other method. While federal regulations allow the use of hormones when raising cattle, pigs and sheep, we do not.
Animals must not be fed animal by-products (including feather meal and rendered fat).
Third-party certified animal welfare standards, including no crates, cages or tethers allowed, except as necessary for transport for fresh beef, pork, lamb, chicken, turkey and goat.
Audits are required for animal welfare at slaughter.
Animal products must be traceable back to the farm(s) or ranch(es).
Products labeled grass-fed must be 100% grass-fed.
Products labeled regenerative or non-GMO must be third-party verified or certified.
Synthetic nitrates and nitrites are prohibited.
Meat must not be treated with ionizing radiation.
Transglutaminase (meat glue) and lean finely textured beef are prohibited.
Cultured or lab-grown meat is prohibited.
Meat must not be sourced from genetically engineered (GMO/BE) or cloned animals.
Multi-ingredient meat and poultry products must adhere to our Whole Foods Market Food Ingredient Standards.
We do not sell foie gras.
Animal Welfare Certified Meats
In our Meat department, all fresh beef, pork, chicken, turkey, goat and lamb must be certified to meet 100+ animal welfare standards.**
Since 1981, our Meat department has had requirements for how the animals are raised, and we’ve incrementally strengthened those standards over the years. Notably, in 2011 we began requiring third-party certification for the most-purchased species in the butcher case. In 2024, we expanded our standards to require third-party certification across the entire Meat department, offering our shoppers even more animal-welfare certified choices.
Our firm deadline for transition is the end of 2026 when animal welfare certification will be in place for all meat and poultry** in the Meat department, including fresh products of all species, as well as frozen and prepackaged items, such as heat-and-eat, ready-to-cook, ready-to-eat, smoked and cured/uncured. In the interim and beyond, we provide shoppers with the transparency they expect and deserve by requiring that the certification seal appears on product packaging.
To support and encourage producers who are committed to good animal-welfare practices, we offer several options for animal welfare certification. This enables farms and ranches of differing scale and size to choose the program that best complements their location and system.
The following third-party certifications have been carefully vetted and approved by Whole Foods Market. They offer rigorous standards focused on animal welfare that cover the entire life of the animal, and each certification includes more than 100 specific animal welfare requirements:
⦁ G.A.P. Animal Welfare Certified
⦁ A Greener World (AGW) Animal Welfare Approved
⦁ Certified Humane Raised & Handled
⦁ Regenerative Organic Certified
Global Animal Partnership
Founded in 2008, Global Animal Partnership is a nonprofit organization of farmers, scientists, retailers, manufacturers and animal advocates. The G.A.P. Animal Welfare Certified tiered system gives shoppers the knowledge to make informed food choices, and provides farmers and ranchers with a road map to improve their welfare practices.
Below are the descriptions you’ll find on Animal Welfare Certified items. From Base Certification to Step 5+, each step has its own requirements that must be met before authorized, independent certifiers can assign a level of certification.
Base Level: 100+ standards; no cages, crates or crowding
Enrichments provided to encourage natural behavior
Access to outdoors with environmental enrichments
Raised on pasture; no feedlots
Raised on pasture; no physical alterations
Entire life on same farm
A Greener World (AGW) Animal Welfare Approved
In 2014, A Greener World launched with a mission that includes promoting agricultural systems that can have a positive impact on animals, providing guidance to livestock farmers and ranchers and establishing farm certification programs, including Animal Welfare Approved.
Certified Humane Raised & Handled
Certified Humane Raised and Handled is a farm-animal welfare certification program developed by a 40-member scientific committee of animal scientists and veterinarians. This certification requires farmers and processors to comply with precise, objective standards for humane treatment of animals and traceability.
Regenerative Organic Certified
The Regenerative Organic Alliance (ROA) is a nonprofit collaboration that seeks to elevate and further regenerative organic agriculture through its Regenerative Organic Certified program, which builds on a baseline requirement of organic certification with additional criteria within three pillars: soil health, animal welfare and social fairness.
Animal-Specific Standards
We hold all our meat suppliers to high animal welfare standards. But different animals have different welfare needs, and we strive to address those as well. For information on required animal welfare practices, visit the certification program websites. Here are just a few examples that exhibit our commitment:
Chicken
The birds must be provided with appropriate litter for comfort and to satisfy natural foraging instincts.
On poultry products (chicken and turkey) you may see the phrase, “Complete Traceability to Farms.” This means further steps were taken to ensure that specific traceability procedures are in place at each step of the supply chain.
We take the welfare of broiler chickens seriously. Learn more about our commitment to broiler chicken welfare.
Pork
Gestation stalls and farrowing (birthing) crates are not permitted, and bedding is required in housing.
Turkey
The birds must be provided with appropriate litter for comfort and to satisfy natural foraging instincts.
On poultry products (chicken and turkey) you may see the phrase, “Complete Traceability to Farms.” This means further steps were taken to ensure that specific traceability procedures are in place at each step of the supply chain.
Lamb
Lambs must be raised on pasture or range for at least two-thirds of the animal’s life.
Veal
The calves must be pasture-raised or live in group housing with no tethering, individual stalls or crates. While we don’t allow animal by-products in feed, cow’s milk is allowed for veal calves, and they must be provided with grass, forages and/or grain.
Organic, Regenerative and Non-GMO Meat and Poultry
We’re proud to offer a good selection of meat and poultry products with additional verified attributes. Here is what our standards require for each of these labels in our Meat department:
Organic
Animal products labeled organic in the U.S. must meet federally regulated organic standards for raising the animals, feed, processing and labeling.
Regenerative
At Whole Foods Market, a product making a regenerative claim on its primary display panel must meet our Regenerative Agriculture Claims Policy.
Non-GMO
Products labeled non-GMO at Whole Foods Market must be either organic or Non-GMO Project Verified.
Behind the Scenes: Our Meat Department
Watch this video to learn more about our meat suppliers and products that go above and beyond.
Meet a Pork Supplier: Thompson Farms
Take a tour of Thompson Farms, a family-owned hog farm in Georgia that supplies pork to Whole Foods Market and is G.A.P. Animal Welfare Certified to Step 4.
*There are no hormones approved for use in the production of poultry, goat, veal calves, mature sheep or exotic, non-amenable species (such as bison, buffalo, elk and venison).
**Kosher turkey and chicken cannot be animal-welfare certified due to differing slaughter requirements for kosher certification. However, the birds must be raised and third-party verified to the same required 100+ animal welfare standards.
Note to product suppliers: The information on this page is intended for our shoppers. It's not for use in developing products as it doesn't include all Whole Foods Market requirements and restrictions. Creating a product that meets our standards does not guarantee that we will sell it.
