According to media reports, RSPCA scientific officer Melina Tenses has clarified that the organisation’s pig production standards are designed on the basis of ensuring a better quality of life for the animals.

The RSPCA contends that pigs can be raised in a range of environments to meet animal welfare standards – be it an indoor environment, and outdoor environment or a combination of the two.

The organisation yesterday came under fire from from New South Wales Greens MP John Kaye who said that the RSPCA's accreditation and labeling standards were misleading because people who bought pork with an RSPCA stamp would assume it was from a free-range pig.

Ms Tensen said rather than meeting the blanket definition of free range (a term which last August was removed from the RSPCA’s approved pig farming scheme), RSPCA pork accreditation means simply that pigs’ behavioural needs are being met.

“At RSPCA-approved farms, there are no sow stalls, farrowing crates or barren concrete pens,” she said.

According to The Age, a complaint was yesterday lodged with the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission by free-range accrediting organisation Humane Choice, alleging the RSPCA's labeling is misleading.