I read this article this morning and just had to put it on the blog...there is something creepy about all this...it has again made me think about where our priorities are....
"It comes free-range, cage-free, antibiotic-free, raised on vegetarian feed, organic, even air-chilled. Coming soon: stress-free?
Two premium chicken producers, Bell & Evans in Pennsylvania and Mary’s Chickens in California, are preparing to switch to a system of killing their birds that they consider more humane.
The new system uses carbon dioxide gas to gently render the birds unconscious before they are hung by their feet to have their throats slit, sparing them the potential suffering associated with conventional slaughter methods.
“When you grab a chicken, turn it upside down and put it on the line, it’s stress, stress, stress,” said Scott Sechler, the owner of Bell & Evans. “Our system is designed so that we put them to sleep without stress, and we kill them without stress.”
That is sure to appeal to a segment of the chicken-buying public. But telling them about it presents a marketing challenge.
“Most of the time, people don’t want to think about how the animal was killed,” said David Pitman, whose family owns Mary’s Chickens.
Anglia Autoflow, the company that is building the knockout systems for the two processors, calls the process “controlled atmosphere stunning,” but Pitman said his company is considering the phrase “sedation stunning” for use on its packages. Also on the short list: “humanely slaughtered,” “humanely processed” or “humanely handled.”
The trick, he said, is to communicate the goal of the new system, which is to ensure that the birds “not have any extra pain or discomfort in the last few minutes of their lives.”
Temple Grandin, a professor of animal science at Colorado State University and a prominent livestock expert, consulted with Bell & Evans as the company worked with Anglia to design its system. She said it was better because the chickens were not aware of what was happening to them.
Sechler said the system he chose, after years of research, was better than similar gas-stunning systems used in Europe. Those systems, he says, often deprive birds of oxygen too quickly, which may cause them to suffer. They are also designed to kill the birds rather than simply knock them out, something that Sechler is not comfortable with.
“I don’t want the public to say we gas our chickens,” he said.
Sechler said he expects the chickens to be more tender because they faced less stress when they died.
The new system is also meant to be better for workers. The live hang area today is usually dimly lit to keep birds from being startled, and workers have to contend with struggling, flapping chickens.
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals has been pushing chicken processors for years to switch to gas stunning systems, in part because it doesn’t believe that electrical stunning works.
But the National Chicken Council, which represents chicken processors, contends that electrical stunning systems are effective and humane.
Richard Lobb, a spokesman for the council, said that being shackled upside down was not overly stressful for the birds.
“They are shackled, and they typically stay there quietly,” Lobb said.
Bell & Evans said it would begin selling chickens slaughtered using the new technology in April. The company, which processes about 840,000 birds a week, distributes its chickens nationwide.
Mary’s, which distributes in several Western states, expects to install the technology in June. The company processes about 200,000 birds a week.
By comparison, a single plant run by a large processor like Tyson Foods may handle more than 1 million birds a week.
The gas technology is expensive. Each company said it would cost about $3 million to convert their operations and more over time to run the systems. That makes it a hard sell in a commodity-oriented industry that relies on huge volumes and low costs to turn narrow margins into profits.
Sechler predicted that consumers would come to demand birds slaughtered in the new way, which would force the industry to gradually switch over.
But to demand it, consumers have to know about it, which gets back to the language on the label.
In Britain, although many chicken processors use gas stunning, store packages typically don’t mention it.
“People don’t want to know too much,” said Marc Cooper, a senior scientific manager in the farm animals department of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, in London. “It’s hard to sell humane killing as a concept.”
The new system uses carbon dioxide gas to gently render the birds unconscious before they are hung by their feet to have their throats slit, sparing them the potential suffering associated with conventional slaughter methods.
“When you grab a chicken, turn it upside down and put it on the line, it’s stress, stress, stress,” said Scott Sechler, the owner of Bell & Evans. “Our system is designed so that we put them to sleep without stress, and we kill them without stress.”
That is sure to appeal to a segment of the chicken-buying public. But telling them about it presents a marketing challenge.
“Most of the time, people don’t want to think about how the animal was killed,” said David Pitman, whose family owns Mary’s Chickens.
Anglia Autoflow, the company that is building the knockout systems for the two processors, calls the process “controlled atmosphere stunning,” but Pitman said his company is considering the phrase “sedation stunning” for use on its packages. Also on the short list: “humanely slaughtered,” “humanely processed” or “humanely handled.”
The trick, he said, is to communicate the goal of the new system, which is to ensure that the birds “not have any extra pain or discomfort in the last few minutes of their lives.”
Temple Grandin, a professor of animal science at Colorado State University and a prominent livestock expert, consulted with Bell & Evans as the company worked with Anglia to design its system. She said it was better because the chickens were not aware of what was happening to them.
Sechler said the system he chose, after years of research, was better than similar gas-stunning systems used in Europe. Those systems, he says, often deprive birds of oxygen too quickly, which may cause them to suffer. They are also designed to kill the birds rather than simply knock them out, something that Sechler is not comfortable with.
“I don’t want the public to say we gas our chickens,” he said.
Sechler said he expects the chickens to be more tender because they faced less stress when they died.
The new system is also meant to be better for workers. The live hang area today is usually dimly lit to keep birds from being startled, and workers have to contend with struggling, flapping chickens.
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals has been pushing chicken processors for years to switch to gas stunning systems, in part because it doesn’t believe that electrical stunning works.
But the National Chicken Council, which represents chicken processors, contends that electrical stunning systems are effective and humane.
Richard Lobb, a spokesman for the council, said that being shackled upside down was not overly stressful for the birds.
“They are shackled, and they typically stay there quietly,” Lobb said.
Bell & Evans said it would begin selling chickens slaughtered using the new technology in April. The company, which processes about 840,000 birds a week, distributes its chickens nationwide.
Mary’s, which distributes in several Western states, expects to install the technology in June. The company processes about 200,000 birds a week.
By comparison, a single plant run by a large processor like Tyson Foods may handle more than 1 million birds a week.
The gas technology is expensive. Each company said it would cost about $3 million to convert their operations and more over time to run the systems. That makes it a hard sell in a commodity-oriented industry that relies on huge volumes and low costs to turn narrow margins into profits.
Sechler predicted that consumers would come to demand birds slaughtered in the new way, which would force the industry to gradually switch over.
But to demand it, consumers have to know about it, which gets back to the language on the label.
In Britain, although many chicken processors use gas stunning, store packages typically don’t mention it.
“People don’t want to know too much,” said Marc Cooper, a senior scientific manager in the farm animals department of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, in London. “It’s hard to sell humane killing as a concept.”
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