March 22, 2007

UK's Sainsbury's to sell only free-range eggs and eggs from organic diets

Sainsbury's, one of the four largest retailers in the United Kingdom, announced it would now be selling only eggs from free range chickens and chickens fed organic feed.

The retailer's move is part of a growing trend in the EU towards eggs from cage-free chickens as the call for more animal welfare in European countries grow louder. 

Sainsbury's move would mean at least 600,000 hens freed from cages over the next four years, assuming demand stays constant.

Trading director Mike Coupe said Sainsbury's is committed to phasing out all its caged eggs ahead of 2012, and is currently working with its egg suppliers to achieve 100 percent UK cage-free eggs.

However, the supermarket could not make the transformation fast enough as the production industry has yet to keep up. Currently there is a shortage of eggs from free range, organic and barn systems. The result has been that of illegal moves to label caged eggs as that from cage-free eggs.

UK's Defra (Department of Farms and Rural Affairs) is investigating European producers who may have sent as many as 500 million eggs mislabeled as cage-free eggs over to the UK for the past 5 years.

Free-range eggs are sold for up to 80 percent more than those from caged birds.