How do we achieve a balance between animal welfare, consumer expectations and farming practise in egg production?
The five freedoms of animal welfare
Animal welfare legislation and the Farm Animal Welfare Council (FAWC) - a government advisory body - state that, at all times, you have a duty of care to ensure your animals have freedom:
The brambell report 1965
Who came up with the five freedoms? The concept of Five Freedoms originated with the Report of the Technical Committee to Enquire into the Welfare of Animals kept under Intensive Livestock Husbandry Systems, the Brambell Report, December 1965 (HMSO London, ISBN 0 10 850286 4). This stated that farm animals should have freedom “to stand up, lie down, turn around, groom themselves and stretch their limbs,” a list that is still sometimes referred to as Brambell’s Five Freedoms.
Consumer expectations About the egg but also the conditions for the chicken (want to know what they are paying for) 1. yolk colour- the consumer expects to have a dark coloured egg hue (yolk). 2. Shell quality
responding to the consumers expectations costs the farmers, making them increase their work load. This puts pressure on the farmers.
Farming responses to consumer expectations 1. Yolk colour is determined by the content
and profile of pigmenting
carotenoids present in their feed
and can easily be adapted via
feed ingredients to match consumer
preferences.
2.
How do consumers select free range eggs and are they willing to pay more?
43% of participants rely solely on seeing the words free range
39% want to see the logo of a free range certification body
Just 4% of participants were not prepared to pay more for free range eggs
The majority of participants said they would pay a premium of between $3 and $5 more for free
range eggs
What are consumers expectations of free range eggs?
The most popular descriptions of what free range meant to participants concerned the ability of birds to move around and access the outdoors
There was considerable support for setting a maximum number of birds outdoors to give birds more space
The majority of participants said they did not know what that maximum number of birds should be.
Among those participants who selected a maximum outdoor stocking density, there was almost no
support for a maximum of 20,000 birds per hectare, with significantly lower limits preferred
hens to be healthy, free of antibiotics
Controversial thoughts/ideas towards egg production (consumer expectations) 1. Health of hens
Caged eggs
Cramped battery cages were banned across the EU in 2012, but animal welfare experts agree that new and so-called improved “enriched” cages are not a great deal better. The birds have slightly more room to move than in conventional battery cages – 13 to 14 hens per square metre and a few furnishings – but their ability to behave naturally remains severely restricted. Beak trimming is routine. If you want eggs laid by happy hens, avoid caged, which means the cheapest eggs, including some supermarket value ranges. If you must opt for caged, make sure they bear the British Lion symbol so you know they were British-laid; some EU countries flout the law and continue to keep hens in battery cages. Some retailers such as Waitrose, Sainsbury’s, the Co-op and Marks & Spencer, no longer sell eggs from caged birds.
Barn eggs
If price is an important issue for you, opt for barn eggs rather than caged if possible. Barn-raised hens can roam freely indoors and perform many of their natural behaviours, like dust bathing and scratching. They also have platforms to perch on to escape pecking and nest boxes for laying eggs. But most barn-raised hens stay inside all their lives and in comparatively crowded conditions, with up to nine hens per square meter. Beak trimming is routine.
Free range
About 50 per cent of all eggs produced in the UK are free-range – laid by hens that enjoy unlimited daytime access to runs that have vegetation, and at least four square metres of outside space per bird. At night, free-range hens are housed in barns furnished with bedding and perches, with nine hens allowed per square meter of inside space. But there is no limit on flock size, a fact exploited by some producers. Beak trimming is commonly practiced, except for most free-range British Blacktail eggs.
Organic
According to Compassion in World Farming, organically reared hens offer the highest potential standards of animal welfare. They enjoy more access to the outdoors than non-organic free-range birds and less crowded living conditions indoors – up to six hens per square meter in flocks of no more than 3000. Routine beak trimming is not permitted
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/foodanddrink/foodanddrinkadvice/11411975/What-are-the-most-ethical-eggs-you-can-buy.html
Sue Quinn
7:00AM GMT 15 Feb 2015
health and vigour
•from discomfort - an appropriate environment should be provided, including shelter and a comfortable resting area
•from hunger and thirst - animals must have access to fresh water and a diet which will maintain
•to express normal behaviour - sufficient space, proper facilities and company of the animal’s own kind should be provided
•from fear and distress - you must provide conditions and treatment which avoid mental suffering
•from pain, injury or disease - you must ensure the prevention of illnesses, or rapid diagnosis and treatment
Make sure that feeding space is adequate and that the distribution of feeders allows good access by the birds. As a guide, a minimum of 10 cm of linear trough space, or 4 cm of circular feeder, per bird is recommended.
● Seasonal changes in temperature can exert a major influence on feed intake - particularly in poorly insulated houses. Food consumption can change by as much as 30–40 g/bird/day from summer to winter, which represents a challenge to the stock keeper and nutritionist in avoiding welfare problems and maintaining performance. Increasing the quantity of feed supplied to the birds during cold weather, coupled with seasonal changes in the concentration of nutrients in the diets, are the key details.
● Birds in alternative systems tend to be more sensitive to marginal dietary deficiencies than birds in cage systems, and low levels of intake of some key nutrients can predispose the birds to pecking.
Inadequate, poorly designed or poorly laid out feeders, drinkers, nestboxes and perches will create stress in the flock and will compromise both bird welfare and performance.
Numbers of feeders, drinkers and nestboxes must meet the minimum requirements set out in relevant UK legislation.
The welfare of hens in free range systems 5
● Perches should be arranged so that birds can move easily between them and the other equipment, thereby reducing the risk of collisions and subsequent bruising and/or other damage. Consideration should be given to minimising bird stress and downgrading during catching at the end of the laying period – can the equipment easily be removed from the pens or winched up out of the way ? ● Because of the importance of thorough cleaning between flocks, equipment, fixtures and fittings should be selected and installed for ease of cleaning. The ability to remove equipment and fittings in order to achieve a really thorough clean is usually the best option, although this is often not practicable in the case of nestboxes, perches and slatted floors. Where equipment is not removable, it is even more important to give some thought to how less accessible sections or areas of the nestboxes or slatted floors will be cleaned.
#
It is essential for drinkers to be at the optimum height for the birds. This too reduces wastage.
because livestock and poultry share water and feed troughs and seek close contact with one another by licking, laying on each other and even rubbing snouts and noses, illnesses can spread rapidly. Sometimes, veterinarians recommend using antibiotics to prevent diseases at times when livestock are particularly at risk, like during weaning from the mother. Swift, preventive actions often mean a livestock will receive fewer antibiotics than they would have if they had not received a preventive dose. https://www.meatinstitute.org/index.php?ht=a/GetDocumentAction/i/99943
Laws
2012 Conventional battery cages for laying hens are banned in the EU from 1st January by
Council Directive 1999/74/EC102
2004
Compulsory method of production labelling is introduced for retail shell eggs in the EU by Council
Regulation
(EC) No. 5/200193 (the law on egg labelling as to farming method is now to be found in Council
Regulation (EC) No. 1234/2007 and Commission Regulation (EC) No. 589/2008)
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/farm-animals-looking-after-their-welfare#feeding-and-watering
states that If you’re responsible for a farm animal you must make sure that you care for it properly.
check health of hens once a day if housed
isolate sick animals
not use breeding methods that may cause suffering or injury
must not use electric currents to stop an animal
keep health records
feed: You must not:
•feed animals any substance, food or liquid that can cause them unnecessary suffering or injury
•use feed that makes the animals who eat it unable to produce food that’s safe for humans to eat
•feed animals anything that hasn’t been proved to be safe for them, unless it’s medicine or other welfare-related products
•feed animals catering waste
You must not keep animals in permanent darkness.
You must make sure that you keep air circulation, dust levels, temperature, relative humidity and gas concentrations at levels that don’t harm your animals
Check the welfare codes of recommendations and guides to find out if there are specific requirements. For example, for meat chickens you must keep the concentration of ammonia below 20 parts per million measured at hen head level.
Equipment you must inspect includes:
•feed hoppers
•drinkers
•ventilating fans
•heating and lighting units
•fire extinguishers
•alarm systems
http://www.poultryclub.org/poultry/health-and-diseases/ poultry helath
free range outdoor hens grazing
You should:
•make sure that birds are protected from bad weather, predators and risks to their health
•make sure birds have access to a well-drained laying area all the time
•provide and manage vegetation, outdoor scratch, whole grain feeding, a fresh water supply and overhead cover
•make sure that feed, water and cover should are far enough away from the house to encourage birds to range
feather pecking, solution is beak trimming
building
•help keep good health and good management of the birds
•be easy to maintain for hygiene and air quality
•offer shelter from bad weather
•limit the risk of disease, behavioural problems, traumatic injuries and injuries caused by birds to each other
•limit contamination from bird droppings
•keep out predators, rodents and wild animals
•minimise insect infestations
•help prevent internal and external parasite infestations (and be easy for you to treat any that do break out)
•have damp-proof membranes to prevent insulation breakdown, and measures to prevent vermin easily getting to the insulation material
Laying hens beak trimming
You can only carry out beak trimming on laying hens:
•using an infra-red beak trimming method
•on birds under 10 days old - ideally you should carry it out on day-old chicks
dewing of hens- When you need to prevent flight you can clip the flight feathers of one wing.
You do not though normally have to this as most birds used for domestic production have limited flight capability.