Battery-farm backlash boosts free-range eggs
UK - Shoppers concerned about animal welfare in Britain's £3bn-a-year poultry industry have sent sales of free range and organic chickens and eggs surging.The National Farmers Union revealed yesterday that purchases of chickens allowed to roam outdoors are rising at 10 times the rate of chickens mass produced in large artificially lit sheds.
Meanwhile sales of more humane free range, organic and barn eggs are rising fast while sales of eggs from battery chickens are falling.
According to a report released by the market analyst Mintel today, sales of eggs produced by the three "kinder" methods increased by 24 per cent between 2002 and 2005 to two billion.
Eggs from battery chickens fell by 8 per cent to 2.9 billion over the same period. The figures come a week after the Government published a report showing conditions for Britain's 800 million intensively raised broiler chickens remain poor.
Source: The Independant
9 August 2006
1 minute read
