Two recent rulings of the Dutch Advertising Code Committee shed light on a hot topic in Dutch advertising: animal welfare claims in relation to meat products. While Dutch consumers are made more and more aware of the downsides of factory farming, supermarkets try to market their products as 'sustainable' or 'animal friendly.' But what is 'sustainable' or 'animal friendly?' Some will say that meat products are never 'sustainable' or 'animal friendly,' while others will claim that they are as soon as they are better than regular factory farming products. The latter view was taken by two supermarkets, but they saw their advertising claims being scrutinized by the Dutch Advertising Code Committee (RCC 2014/00369, 2014/00382). The supermarkets claimed that their somewhat more animal friendly meat was indeed 'sustainable' and 'animal friendly.' Lacking a clear legal standard on animal welfare, the Committee turns to the animal welfare scale of the Dutch Society for the Protection of Animals (Dierenbescherming). And as the products still scored low on that scale, the claims are found to be misleading.
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