Gippsland › Latest news › Gippsland

Gippsland needs true free-range farms, as altered standards mislead consumers, harming chicken and environment health

Gippsland and Victoria need more genuine free-range farms for real consumer choice. Politicians altered standards, allowing misleading labels and intensive producers to avoid scrutiny. This harms chicken welfare and environmental health.

By news@gippsland - 11th September 2024 - Back to News

More genuine free range farms are needed in Gippsland and the rest of Victoria to give consumers a real choice. Ideally, every township in the country should have a nearby egg farm instead of requiring eggs to be trucked across the country to a stupidmarket.

Who said chooks can't fly. Phil with one of the flocks on the farm. Their shed can hold about 400 hens but we stock it with about 250

Free-range standards deceptive

Our politicians changed the Australian free range standard to allow intensive producers to sell eggs with misleading free-range labels. Egg cartons must display stocking densities, but as there's no actual requirement for the chickens to go outside, the labels are meaningless. Changes to the freerange definition protects big producers from prosecution under Australian Consumer Law.The ACCC had been so successful with various prosecutions in the Federal Court that corporate egg producers demanded protection.

High stocking densities are more stressful for the chicken. Hens display some aggressive behaviours such as pecking, bullying and even cannibalism as they fight it out to maintain their hierarchy in cramped conditions, making way for justifications for widespread beak-trimming and debeaking.10,000 hens per hectare is not sustainable or responsible farming.A laying hen produces half a cubic metre of manure a year.

Manure pollutes waterways

So, a stocking density of 10,000 hens per hectare means that farmers who follow that advice see their land covered with 5000 cubic metres of manure per hectare every year. High levels of ammonia, nitrogen, potassium and phosphorus in hen manure can destroy soil health and leach into the ground, leading to contamination of waterways.

Labelling requirements and standards for free range egg production introduced by politicians in 2018 destroyed any remaining consumer confidence in the Australian egg industry. The standard allows intensive production systems to be classified as free range and protects intensive producers from prosecution under Australian Consumer Law.

Pictures from Freerange Eggs website.

Source: http://gippsland.com/

Published by: news@gippsland.com