These following commitments outline our requirements for suppliers of poultry, eggs, pork, dairy and beef. This includes our goals to transition to 100% cage-free shell eggs by 2025, pending available supply; to transition our pork supply to be raised in an open pen gestation system; and our stance on antibiotics and antimicrobial stewardship.
Scope
We expect our suppliers to follow or exceed the All supplier partners must comply with these standards standards below when producing products for sale at Target. Our commitment applies to the following product groups:
Food
- Meat (beef, pork, lamb) and poultry (chicken, turkey).
- Shell eggs.
- Dairy products.
- Meat, poultry or dairy deli products.
Standards and commitments
We expect our vendor partners producing both owned brand and national brand food and beverage items to meet or exceed the following standards:
- Poultry: Documented adherence to the National Chicken Council (NCC) and National Turkey Federation (NTF) guidelines.
- Eggs: Documented adherence to the United Egg Producers (UEP) guidelines.
- Pork: Documented adherence to the Pork Quality Assurance+ (PQA+) and Transportation Quality Assurance+ (TQA+) and to the North American Meat Institute slaughter guidelines.
- Dairy: Documented adherence to Farmers Assuring Responsible Management (FARM) program.
- Beef: Documented adherence to the North American Meat Institute slaughter guidelines. Target supports its beef vendors transitioning to Dr. Temple Grandin’s Responsible Cattle Care Audit program.
Eggs
Target commits to transition to only cage-free shell eggs by 2025, pending available supply. The extreme volatility in the egg market and the impact of avian influenza on our two largest facilities producing Good & Gather cage-free eggs in 2022 and continuing into 2023 has significantly impeded our progress on our cage-free goal. Despite headwinds, we are pleased to have achieved an increase in our percentage of sales of shell eggs coming from cage-free systems which improved to 58% in 2022. Additionally, 100% of liquid eggs have been converted to cage-free and all but one national brand fully converted to cage-free or better. We will report annually on our progress.
Pork
In 2012, we pledged to eliminate gestation crates from our pork supply chain by 2022. We launched all Good & Gather fresh pork raised in an open pen gestation system in September 2022. Good & Gather represents the vast majority of fresh pork sales. Having achieved this, we are moving towards a true crate-free assortment in Good & Gather. We’ll do this by continuing to collaborate across our value chain to drive progress in the industry, and we are in talks with our business partners on achieving gestation crate-free products via third-party certification.
As we look ahead, we continue to expect that all pork suppliers further reduce, and eventually eliminate, the number of days sows are housed in gestation crates. We will report annually on our progress.
Dairy
Target supports advances in dairy farming practices to include the use of genetic breeding programs to promote polled cattle (naturally hornless) to benefit the welfare of the cows and of the farmers who care for them by eliminating the need for dehorning.
Target supports the National Milk Producers Federation (NMPF) ban on tail docking and asks suppliers to provide evidence that they do not use this practice.
Pain management
We ask all suppliers of meat, deli and dairy products to find and implement alternative solutions to painful procedures (for example, tail docking, de-horning and castration) where possible. We ask that pain management be used during the transition period of eliminating painful procedures.
Stunning requirements
Meat and poultry suppliers must ensure that animals are rendered unconscious and insensible to pain prior to slaughter, except where prohibited by religious constraint. Target supports the Orthodox Union ban on the shackling and hoist method for kosher slaughter and asks suppliers to provide evidence that they do not use this practice and are using Dr. Temple Grandin’s Upright Restrain Box Method.
Auditing
We expect all suppliers of meat and egg products to work with their suppliers to conduct weekly internal animal welfare evaluations and, at a minimum, annual third-party animal welfare audits on every farm supplying Target. They must provide third-party audit details and results to Target on an annual basis. We expect all suppliers of dairy products to work with their suppliers to conduct weekly internal animal welfare evaluations and, at a minimum, annual second-party FARM program evaluations on every farm supplying Target. They must provide evaluation details and results to Target on an annual basis.
Antibiotics and antimicrobial2
We believe sick animals must be treated appropriately to end or reduce suffering. When antibiotics or antimicrobials are administered by a registered veterinarian, using them judiciously for therapeutic purposes, they play a critical role in the overall well-being of an animal.
However, we do not support the use of routine, non-therapeutic antimicrobials to promote growth or prevent disease. We expect our suppliers and the producers they work with to phase out these practices and only use antimicrobials when medically necessary.
There is greater risk to human health when antimicrobial-resistant bacteria develop due to overuse and misuse of certain medically-important antimicrobials. In response to this risk, we ask our suppliers to minimize and remove the use of those deemed critical for human health listed in the “2017 WHO guidelines on use of medically important antimicrobials in food-producing animals” and listed in FDA Guidance #152.
We also request that our suppliers promote transparency by annually providing an antibiotics management report to Target and publicly report antibiotic use on an annual basis.
