Bringing Sustainability Into The Kitchen with Maple Leaf Farms Duck

More and more Americans are searching for sustainable products to stock in their kitchens to reduce the impact their food choices have on the environment. Whether it’s growing some of our own food or trying to eat foods that are in season, we have more options than ever when exploring nutritious foods that are healthier for the environment.

When searching out foods that are good for the environment and your diet, the best way to make a change is to find sustainably minded food producers to source your products from. Although produce companies are often touted as friendlier to the environment, many meat and poultry companies are also leading the way with their sustainability efforts.

Through the Maple Leaf Farms Trident Stewardship and Corporate Sustainability Programs, our company fulfills our commitment to using farming practices that help conserve natural resources and produce foods with less energy, water and waste. Here is a brief overview of how we have reduced our environmental impact in the past few years.

Responsible Sourcing and Production
As a vertically integrated poultry company, Maple Leaf Farms does not outsource important supplies or production steps. This means we can have greater control of quality and efficiency at every step of production, leading to full traceability of our birds and the feeds they are fed. We can also assure our customers that our feeds do not include added growth hormones or antibiotics.

To further demonstrate our commitment to quality and transparency, Maple Leaf Farms operations undergo annual food safety audits to assure our customers of our high production standards. In fact, our feed mill has earned a Safe Feed Safe Food certification from the American Food Industry Association and our food plants have earned an AA rating through annual Global Food Safety Initiative audits for more than a decade.

Conserving Resources
Maple Leaf Farms is also committed to reducing the amount of valuable natural resources we use to farm and produce our foods. Some of our notable accomplishments include:

• Improving the fuel efficiency of our fleet by more than 40%
• Reducing electricity needs by upgrading to LED lighting and replacing equipment with more efficient models
• Diverting nearly 1,000 tons of waste from landfills through recycling programs

• Reducing water usage by nearly 5% and increasing the amount applied to local farmland by 5%
• Using recycled packaging and pallets, allowing us to divert nearly 300 tons of waste from landfills and save nearly 3,000 trees

When you choose Maple Leaf Farms duck, rest assured that we are focused on continually improving our sustainability programs and care about reducing the impact we have on the environment.