Smithfield Foods is the target of an animal-rights lawsuit, which accuses world’s largest pork producer of misleading consumers over how it treats animals in the U.S. food supply chain. The lawsuit, filed by the Humane Society of the United States, one of the most vocal animal-rights activist organizations in the country, accuses Smithfield of failing to eliminate gestation crates for mother pigs.
According to HSUS, the cages used to house the pigs are “barely larger than the animals’ own bodies and they prevent them from turning around.” In the past, such measures were taken in the hog industry because data show that sows inadvertently crush more than 100 million newborn piglets each year. HSUS says that Smithfield never fully eliminated the gestation crates as the company said it would back in 2007, and HSUS is unhappy that that it appears Smithfield only reduced the amount of time it requires pigs to spend inside of them.