September 27, 2006

 

RSPCA wants UK producers to adopt better standards for chicken

 

 

RSPCA in the UK is hoping more poultry producers would improve the welfare of chickens by raising their chickens according to better standards.

 

A report by the RSPCA said current rearing conditions can cause the birds chronic leg disorders and even heart failure.

 

The group wants producers to adopt better conditions than the Red Tractor standard, which allows broiler chickens a living space "no bigger than an A4 sheet of paper".

 

The group said around 97 percent of the 860 million chickens reared in Britain during the last 10 years are reared in the Red Tractor standard.

 

The chickens are selected to grow quickly, with some chickens taking just over a month to reach slaughter after hatching. The group alleged that only developing countries like Brazil and Thailand have worse conditions.

 

The report warned that rapid growth rates and cramped living conditions increase leg disorders, skin infections and lameness.

 

Red Tractor chickens have a 5 percent mortality rate, compared with a 1.8 percent mortality rate for chickens reared according to the RSPCA's own Freedom Food standards, the group said.

 

Freedom Food Standards allow a bigger area (1.25 sheets of A4 per bird). The lighting is varied and brighter, and birds were supplied with bales, perches and pecking objects for recreation. The caveat-- the birds grow only half as fast.

 

Only a miniscule 1.7 percent of chickens in Britain are reared according to such standards. It is only when more consumers demand higher welfare for chicken would supermarkets stock such products and pressure farmers to raise their standards, RSPCA senior scientific officer Dr Marc Cooper said.

 

However, the National Farmers' Union's poultry board chairman Charles Bourns defended the Red Tractor standards, saying he had tried rearing chickens to Freedom Food standards but had not seen any improvement in their overall health.