Beef is the preferred protein choice for many consumers across Canada. An unexpected positive for many beef producers due to the COVID -19 pandemic is the outreach from consumers to support home-grown and local beef programs. All over social media, interest in buying local food direct from producers has blossomed and gained momentum. Loyal beef customers don’t question the quality and safety of eating beef, but some folks do have concerns about environmental impacts of beef production and animal welfare issues. As a beef producer, there is a lot that you can do to assure your customer that your operation is doing everything right in the interest of the consumer and the animals by becoming trained and certified with the Verified Beef Production Plus (VBP+) program.
VBP+ training covers all five pillars of sustainable beef production: on-farm food safety, environmental stewardship, animal care, biosecurity, and human resources/community involvement. Taking VBP+ training and becoming certified through an audit is proof you can use to show your customers all aspects of beef production on your farm meets industry standards via third party verification.
VBP+ certification adds value to your unique brand and supports the good practices that you’ve put in place to differentiate your beef product (grass-fed, breed-brand, etc.). Investing in your own product is a huge commitment and VBP+ certification can provide protection of that investment through an industry recognized records and management practice verification and audit.
As a direct-to-market producer, there are many different ways to communicate to your customer about what a VBP+ certification means. VBP+ is working on development of a direct to market toolkit to help producers to effectively communicate about their certification and how to correctly use the VBP+ logo.
Stay tuned! There’s more to come on the direct-to-market producer toolkit!
Find out how to become involved today at www.verifiedbeef.ca