United States-Cargill supporting animal welfare.

UNITED STATES-CARGILL HAPPY WITH NEW VIDEO SYSTEM.

Cargill said Monday it has begun implementing a third-party video auditing program to bolster the company’s animal welfare protection systems and will have the program in place at all of its U.S. beef slaughter plants by the end of 2009.

In addition to implementing the remote video auditing service, Cargill created its own humane animal-handling training and certification program for employees.

"Cargill has adopted some of the most rigorous animal care guidelines in the industry," said Cargill Beef President John Keating. "This additional investment gives us the objective input we need to effectively train our people and improve our processes."

"Cargill has been a strong industry leader in the area of animal handling for many years," said animal welfare expert Temple Grandin. "[The system] follows the American Meat Institute’s animal welfare audit system, compiles the data and sends it to the plants for their use to continually help improve their animal welfare programs."