Animal welfare is one of the UK’s most successful exports. When the late Peter Roberts, a Hampshire dairy farmer, founded the charity Compassion in World Farming (ciwf.org.uk) 50 years ago, he rightly feared that industrialised farming would wreak havoc on animals and the planet. Even he couldn’t have envisaged today’s numbers: 70 billion animals are reared globally for meat, milk and eggs each year and two thirds of farm animals are reared intensively. We call it factory farming. The mission of CIWF is to bring it to a halt.

The concept of animal welfare didn’t have an equivalent in Mandarin or Cantonese. Jeff Zhou

It is making progress, particularly when it comes to the elimination of cages for hens, pigs and rabbits. Companies who commit to cage-free chicken supply chains receive CIWF’s prestigious Good Egg award. Altogether across its programme, CIWF claims that working with food producers under its schemes positively impacts the lives of over one billion animals each year.

Exporting these animal welfare protocols to China, now the world’s largest producer of pig meat, chicken and eggs, is an imperative. As a child, Jeff Zhou (CIWF’s Chinese ambassador) witnessed the harrowing slaughter of the family sow for a spring festival. When China held its first ever conference on animal welfare in 2006 he volunteered. He can’t have been massively hopeful since, as he says: “The concept of animal welfare didn’t have an equivalent in Mandarin or Cantonese.”

It does now. A handful of Chinese food producers have signed up to a programme of animal welfare changes. “Handful” might not seem a big deal, but the first crop of 10 Chinese Good Egg Award producers (recently awarded in London) added up to improving the lives of 90 million chickens. Big numbers equal big change.

The big picture: wild at heart

Back to nature: two rescued orangutans in the Bornean rainforest.

An early morning in June, and two orangutans named Amin and Shila are released back into the Bornean rainforest by a team from International Animal Rescue (IAR). This is what success in animal rescue looks like. Their release follows two years of rehabilitation and relearning survival skills after their initial rescue from captivity.

Well dressed: sustainable denim

£141, Get the blues: Kings of Indigo Marian Denim Vintage Mid Blue,£141, hubshop.co.uk

If you love the idea of clothes that have had a previous life then Kings of Indigo could be the denim brand for you. The company has built a reputation on its sustainable approach to manufacturing, developing hand-woven pieces on manually operated looms and using vegetable-dyed fabric to make significant reductions in energy and water usage.

The brand is also known for being rooted in Amsterdam. The popular Red Light Denim collection is created from jeans which have been gathered from the city and recycled into new garments, saving 600 litres of water per pair. Each new pair is produced from a mixture of organic cotton, hemp and at least 21% recycled denim, traceable through a unique tracking system, from bottom to bottom, if you like.

Email Lucy at lucy.siegle@observer.co.uk or follow her on Twitter @lucysiegle