The Soil Association is the main umbrella group in the UK for organic farmers. It provides organic certification services and advisory support, and promotes organics, to the consumer, and through the government and NGOs.

It promotes organic forms of Animal Husbandry and argues that organic farming has higher standards of animal welfare than non-organic systems. Compassion In World Farming regards Soil Association certified animal produce as the best guarentee of high welfare standards avaliable in the United Kingdom.

According to their Web site: "The Soil Association was founded in 1946 by a group of farmers, scientists and nutritionists who observed a direct connection between farming practice and plant, animal, human and environmental health.

"The catalyst was the publication of The Living Soil by Lady Eve Balfour in 1943. The book presented the case for an alternative, sustainable approach to agriculture that has since become known as organic farming."

External link

• www.soilassociation.org