The Chicken Industry
“Each year in the United States, approximately 11 billion animals are raised and killed for meat, eggs, and milk.” This is not super staggering to me since the amount of meat products consumed in the United States is has always been quite high. However, when this number is associated with the number of animals killed and ONLY in the United States, it seems like a very different statistic. The following passages are from the book Food, Ethics, and Society; an article from the Humane Society of the USA. Because of the nature of the facts, I have quoted most of this blog for the hope of sharing with you the pure facts of how chickens are treated in U.S. Industrial Agriculture.
Living Conditions
“Of the 11 billion animals killed annually in the United States, 86% are birds — 98% of land animals in agriculture — and the overwhelming majority are “broiler” chickens raised for meat, approximately 1 million killed per hour… on factory farms, birds raised for meat are confined by the tens of thousands in grower houses, which are commonly artificially lit, force ventilated, and completely barren except for liter material on the floor and long rows of feeders and drinkers.”(Humane Society of the USA) So picture a warehouse or shed type structure with force ventilated fans, poop and liter on the ground and no actual daylight… sounds like prison to me. Not only do they live in a terrible living environment but they also are forced to grow at unbelievably unnatural rates. Their bodies are on the verge of “structural collapse.”(Humane Society of the USA) “Studies consistently show that approximately 26-30% of broiler chickens (which are the type grown for meat) suffer from gait defects severe enough to impair walking ability, and additional research strongly suggests that birds at this level of lameness are in pain.”(Humane Society of the USA) John Webster at the University of Bristol School of Veterinary Science stated that “ Broiler chickens are the only livestock that are in chronic pain for the last 20% of their lives. They don’t move around, not because they are overstocked, but because it hurts their joints so much.” (Humane Society of the USA)
“Market weight is reached after 6-7 weeks for broiler chickens. The chickens are hastily caught and can suffer dislocated and broken hips, legs, and wings, as well as internal hemorrhages during the process. On the journey to the slaughter house, the birds are put into crates stacked one on top of the other, not given any food or water and are afforded little if any protection from extreme temperatures.” (Humane Society of the USA)
The chickens in the egg industry suffer just as much. “Male baby chicks are considered byproducts as they are unable to lay eggs and are not bred for meat production. Therefore, they are gassed, macerated, sucked through a vacuum system, or thrown into garbage bins where they are left to die from dehydration or asphyxiation.”(Humane Society of the USA) In addition, most female chickens are “mutilated without any pain relief.” “To prevent future outbreaks of feather-pecking and other injurious behavior that can result from intensive confinement in barren conditions, tips of their sensitive beaks are seared off with a hot blade.”(Humane Society of the USA)
Cages
“More than 95% of egg-laying hens in U.S. animal agriculture are intensively confined in small, wire ‘battery cages’ stacked several tiers and extending down long warehouses. Hens are given less space than the area of a letter-sized sheet of paper in which to eat, sleep, lay eggs, and defecate. This makes it impossible for the hens to engage in nearly all of their natural behavior, including dust-bathing, foraging, and nesting, the most significant form of frustration for battery caged hens.”(Humane Society of the USA) It also seems as though many countries are banning the practice of confining hens in battery cages, whereas the “U.S. egg producers still overcrowd hens in barren cages so small the birds can’t even spread their wings.”(Humane Society of the USA)
Killing
“When the hens productivity wanes, hens may be ‘force molted’ through low-nutrient feed, until they lose 30-35% of their body weight — to induce another laying cycle. After two years when hens may no longer be profitable, the majority are ‘depopulated’ removed from their cages, a process that can cause broken limbs in nearly one in four hens, and then sent to the slaughter or gassed on the farm. At the slaughter plant, the birds are uncrated, dumped onto conveyor belts, and hung upside down in shackles by their legs. In the United States, birds are typically not rendered unconscious before they are slaughtered, as the U.S. Department of Agriculture does not interpret the federal humane methods of Slaughter Act to extend to farmed birds. Shackled and inverted, their heads pass through an electrified water bath before their throats are cut, usually by a machine. As slaughter lines run at rapid speeds (up to 8,400 chickens per hour), mistakes can occur and up to 3% of birds may still be conscious as they enter tanks of scalding water intended to loosen their feathers.”(Humane Society of the USA)
Throughout all this, I am reminded of how little we really know about what goes on behind the scenes. This industry has tried to rapidly keep up with the MASIVE demand on meat products, which has damaged the process along the way.
So with all that said, what can we do? We can decide to vote with our dollars, spread the word, and bring awareness on the local and national level. My husband and I have decided to buy our meat and milk from sustainable farmers locally in our state. For us, eating meat doesn’t feel wrong, its supporting companies that are intentionally abusing their power, that does. Join us as we try to support local farming and spread the education we have acquired!
This information was sourced from this Humane Society Document inside the textbook Food, Ethics, and Society (PDF): https://www.humanesociety.org/sites/default/files/docs/hsus-report-welfare-animals-meat-egg-dairy-industry.pdf
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