1) How ethical is Yeo Valley – and its yoghurt, ice cream, cream and dessert products?
Strong animal welfare policies
As it’s a dairy company, Ethical Consumer assessed Yeo Valley for its policies on the welfare of its herd. The company rears and milks its own cows, as well as purchasing dairy from two other suppliers, the companies Arla and Organic Milk Suppliers Co-operative (OMSCO).
Yeo Valley was found to be producing and buying only 100% organic certified dairy – the accreditation with the strongest animal welfare criteria in the UK.
It had also published a policy on the treatment of ‘surplus’ calves – male calves born on dairy farms that cannot be used for dairy production. Some dairy farms kill male calves shortly after birth, often by shooting them. Yeo Valley stated that neither the company’s own farms nor its suppliers killed male calves, instead rearing them for, for example, beef production or as breeding bulls.
Compared to other brands in the dairy sector, Yeo Valley received a good score for its animal welfare policies overall.
Poor policies on climate
Yeo Valley scored poorly in Ethical Consumer’s climate rating, when it was analysed in 2024.
On its website and in a questionnaire returned to Ethical Consumer, Yeo Valley talked about some steps it has taken to reduce emissions such as installing solar panels and improving energy efficiencies for refrigeration.
However, it did not outline any meaningful steps to reduce the emissions from its dairy herd - by far the biggest share - except stating that suppliers conducted “carbon assessments”. Livestock is responsible for somewhere between 12 - 20% of all global carbon emissions.
Yeo Valley also did not report its emissions publicly, and did not appear to have set a target in line with international climate goals.
Limited workers’ rights measures
Yeo Valley has taken only limited steps to protect workers’ rights.
In its Modern Slavery Report 2022/23 the company stated: “We have a Responsible Trading Policy and a Supplier Code of Conduct, which cover our sites and our supply chains respectively, that recognise our commitment to the Ethical Trade Initiative (ETI) base code, worker’s rights and compliance to the ILO conventions."
However, the policy could not be found and no evidence appeared to have been published showing that the company expected suppliers to comply with basic requirements like limits to the number of hours in a working week, payment of a living wage, and freedom of association.
The company had not published any information to show good purchasing practices – a vital step to ensure that suppliers are able to treat workers fairly. This could include, for example, avoiding aggressive price negotiation, inaccurate forecasting, late orders, short lead times, and last minute changes.
No evidence could be found that the company actively supported and worked with trade unions to uphold workers' rights.
2) How ethical is Arla – and Yeo Valley’s – milk, butter, spreads, and cheese products?
Poor animal welfare
Unfortunately, Arla performs much more poorly when it comes to the animal welfare of its dairy herd.
While it only supplies organic products to Yeo Valley, the vast majority of its products are not organic, and are therefore not covered by the animal welfare requirements in organic certification.
The company has published some animal welfare criteria in its Farm Management Programme. This states that Arla farmers must assess and report animal welfare quarterly, and provides a number of ‘checkpoints’ on health, housing and feeding. However, all the requirements are vague and are not considered specific or robust enough to ensure good welfare. For example, it states, “All animals must be observed regularly, according to their stage of production, to identify and manage any treatment required and ensure animal health and welfare needs are met.”
Arla has already received several criticisms from journalists and campaigners. In 2023, the Guardian published an article titled “Bucolic scenes on UK milk adverts hide reality of life for ‘battery cows’”. The article stated that the animal rights group Viva! had submitted a complaint over adverts for Arla’s Cravendale milk brand. “An undercover investigation by Viva! confirmed that some of Arla's suppliers operate a zero grazing dairy where the animals will never go outside,” it stated.
In response, Arla stated that supplier farms met “strict and non-negotiable animal welfare standards”, but that not all milk was produced under programmes that stipulate access to pasture.More than 90% of its supplier farms were grass-based, it said.
In 2024, Arla was rated in the Business Benchmark for Animal Welfare, an annual report that rates companies on their animal welfare performance. Arla was placed in the second bottom tier, tier 5, for having animal welfare on its business agenda but with limited evidence of implementation.
“Climate-neutral” marketing claims banned
Livestock farming is a major contributor to climate breakdown, and Arla has taken some steps to address its impacts.
The vast majority of Arla’s emissions arise on its suppliers’ farms. The company stated in its 2024 annual report, “We recognise and reward our farmer owners for their efforts to reduce the carbon footprint of their milk and to protect biodiversity.” Arla paid companies a small amount for introducing carbon reduction measures, like using sustainable feed, renewable electricity or producing biogas. However, it was not clear how these carbon reductions were being quantified and assessed.
Arla has also set emissions reduction targets in line with vital international climate goals.
However, the company has repeatedly been criticised for making misleading claims about the climate impacts of its products. In 2023, a court in Sweden banned Arla Foods from using the term “net-zero climate footprint” in the marketing of its products sold in the country. The court stated: "the company’s advertising misleadingly gives the impression that the product does not give rise to any climate footprint at all. Or that the consumer gets the impression that the company has fully compensated the climate impact caused by the product, despite the fact that it has not been proven to be true.”
In 2022, Netherlands’ advertising standards agency likewise ruled that Arla had misled consumers with its marketing of “climate neutral milk”.
As a result, Arla scored poorly in Ethical Consumer’s climate rating overall.
Subsidiaries in tax havens
Arla owns a number of subsidiaries that are high risk for tax avoidance and located in tax havens such as the United Arab Emirates and Panama.
Although Arla's UK tax strategy was found which stated, “Arla does not utilise tax havens to reduce the Group's tax liabilities”, the subsidiaries did not appear to serve the local population. The company did not appear to have published any public country-by-country reporting – the gold standard for demonstrating fair payment of tax. Nor had it published an adequate policy statement and narrative explanation for the subsidiaries.
The company therefore scored poorly in Ethical Consumer’s tax conduct rating.
The text above was written in December 2025 and January 2026. Most research in Yeo Valley was conducted in May and June 2024, and the research into Arla was conducted in March 2025.