Declaration of procedures without pain relief

Under Swiss animal welfare legislation, painful procedures on animals are prohibited, or must be carried out with pain relief. With this animal-friendly agricultural practice, Switzerland, along with a handful of other countries, plays a leading role worldwide in the management of painful procedures on animals. To highlight this specific production method to Swiss consumers, the Foodstuffs and Consumer Goods Ordinance (LGV) was amended in mid-2025 so that meat from animals on which painful procedures are carried out without prior pain relief in accordance with Swiss animal welfare legislation must be labelled ‘Produced using painful procedures without pain relief’. This change applies to:

• Beef (Bos taurus), whole or in cuts, from animals that have been castrated or dehorned without
  pain relief;
• Pork, whole or in cuts, from animals on which castration, tail docking or teeth clipping was
  carried out without pain relief;
• Meat from chickens, whole or in cuts, whose beaks have been trimmed without pain relief.

This statement reduces the view of animal husbandry and the treatment of animals in producer countries to this brief phase of intervention alone. It fails to highlight the benefits of animal husbandry abroad, such as the year-round grazing of cattle and sheep in the southern hemisphere, where the animals are able to move about and feed in a manner appropriate to their species throughout the year.

GVFI will inform its customers on the delivery documents of the obligation to include the declaration text.