Curious about where our food comes from. I did some research to identify the source of common grocery items. I wanted to identify each product down to the farmer who produced them. If possible, I wanted a high-quality food source that checks all the boxes: locally produced, organic, environmentally friendly, humanely handled, etc… What I found in NYC is that finding this food source for produce was significantly easier than identifying meat products. It was not too difficult to identify produce that is non-GMO and organic at your local grocery store, online grocery delivery, or at your local farmers market. Meat and fish products, however, were another story.
Consumer Reports investigated various food labels and rated each of them here: https://www.consumerreports.org/food-labels/seals-and-claims. Not surprisingly some food label claims are deceiving. What I did find shocking was how difficult it was to identify local meat farmers that checked all the boxes. For example, a meat product may be organic, but not necessarily humanely raised and vise versa. From what I gathered, these food label certifications were not cost-prohibitive to farmers. So for meat products, my sense is if a farmer does not have a specific certification, then their farming method most likely does not qualify them for the certification.
I should also mention that a meat source that does check all the boxes will most likely be sold at a significantly higher price. As a result, we generally try to eat less meat, but eat high quality when we do. More effort and resources are needed so we all have access to high-quality food.
Below is a link to check if your producer is certified:
Non-GMO: https://www.nongmoproject.org/find-non-gmo/verified-products/
USDA Organic: https://organic.ams.usda.gov/integrity/
American Grassfed: https://www.americangrassfed.org/aga-membership/producer-members/
Animal Welfare Approved: https://agreenerworld.org/shop-agw/product-search/
Certified Humane: https://certifiedhumane.org/whos-certified-2/
American Humane: http://www.humaneheartland.org/humane-certified-producers
*Note for meat products, I found that most farmers have some but not most/all of these certifications.
If you live on the East coast, here are high-quality meat sources that I have identified. Please share if you know of others.
Beef: Walker Farm at Whortleberry Hill (http://www.walkergrassfed.com/)
Chicken and eggs: Kingbird Farm (https://kingbirdfarm.com/)
Pork, chicken, and everything about organic production: Rodale Institute (https://rodaleinstitute.org/).
Dairy: Hawthorne Valley Farm (https://farm.hawthornevalley.org/)
For those on the West coast:
Beef: LeftCoast Grassfed in San Mateo, CA (https://leftcoastgrassfed.com/)
Chicken: Treebird Organics in Portland, OR (https://treebirdorganics.grazecart.com/)
Across the US:
Eggs: Cornucopia Institute (https://www.cornucopia.org/scorecard/eggs/)