Organic meat is today much more readily available in supermarkets, farm shops, butchers and via home delivery services. Whilst organic meat is perhaps not yet as popular as organic vegetables, this is probably down to the higher prices, but these will come down as demand increases.
Organic meat is considered to taste better than that from intensively reared animals which is down to their diet and wellbeing. One of the criteria for producing organic meat is that the animals must be fed 95% organic food annually. This compares to the fact that about 99% of non organic farm animals are fed GM soya, according to Organic Food. Animal welfare is also of the utmost importance in the production of organic meat and animals must be free from malnutrition, discomfort, injury and disease. Low densities of animals are also prescribed and they must not be given growth promoters or high protein feeds. Intensively reared animals, on the other hand, are given antibiotics, growth promoting drugs and anti parasite drugs on a regular basis. It is interesting to note that there have been no reported cases of BSE in organic cattle in the UK.
All over the country organic restaurants and other eateries are springing up, many of which serve organic meat on part or all of the menu. Take a look at our organic restaurants page for more information.
There are also many home delivery services for organic meat so you may be able to take advantage of this in your local area or use one of the national deliveries. A Lot of Organics has a list of some of the farms delivering meat or the About Organics site has a directory for all organic produce.
Visit the following pages for more information on organic products:
