Supplemental materials for: Barriers to implementation and execution of U.S. corporate farm animal welfare policy

This dataset contains the supplementary materials of the following study: As public expectations regarding animal welfare continue to evolve, companies are increasingly interested in ensuring that their products are aligned with these expectations, resulting in animal welfare emerging as a key priority within the food and beverage industry corporate social responsibility efforts. Our aim was to understand historic and future drivers of animal welfare policy and identify barriers to implementation within these industries.

We interviewed employees responsible for the development and implementation of animal welfare policy for nine U.S. based, publicly traded food companies. Participants were consistent in their views regarding historic drivers, seeing these as reactive to external pressures to the extent that some measures might have been counterproductive to welfare. When asked to speculate on future drivers, participants referred to strategic decision making, considering a range of factors, including consumer purchasing behavior and the need to increase market share.