The RSPCA is calling on the poultry industry and the EU commission to take urgent action to address fast-growing broiler chickens’ welfare problems following a report by the European Food Safety Authority.
The report has exposed the suffering of fast growing broilers, the majority of the 45,000 million meat chickens produced worldwide each year.
Genetic selection for fast growth has led to broilers being in pain from disabling foot and leg conditions, being lame, having heart conditions and suddenly dying.
Breeding broilers are kept chronically hungry by restricting their food, so that they don’t grow so fast and can live long enough to produce the next generation of broilers without succumbing to the same conditions as their offspring.
Broilers’ welfare
As well as the genetic-related problems they can suffer, the broilers can also be affected by high stocking densities, barren environments, low light intensity and poor litter.
"The scientific evidence shows that selection for fast growth is a major contributor to most of the broilers’ welfare issues, including the most severe. It has gone way beyond what can be considered acceptable and possibly legal," said Dr Marc Cooper, senior chicken welfare scientist with the RSPCA’s Farm Animal Science Department.
"The issues highlighted in the report are not new, only summarising what we have known for a very long time – that the way in which meat chickens have been bred and are typically reared has had, and is increasingly continuing to have, a significant, negative and unacceptable impact on their welfare.
Assurance scheme
"It is therefore crucial that we take action now. Legislation needs to be developed at a European level and the industry must concentrate on improving broiler welfare, rather than concentrating on performance."
The RSPCA’s farm assurance scheme, Freedom Food, is the only farm assurance scheme to only permit the use of genetically slower growing meat chickens. In 2009, 60 million chickens were raised under the Freedom Food scheme.
