July 2002
In June 2002, after almost two years of working with PETA, the Food Marketing Institute and the National Council of Chain Restaurants released their first-ever retail farmed-animal welfare guidelines. The guidelines cover a wide range of issues, from anesthetized mutilation of dairy cows to farm-to-slaughterhouse transportation. While basic, these guidelines are historic in that the entire grocery and chain-restaurant industries have agreed that there are standard practices in the meat industry that are clearly abusive toward animals.