Demanding the right to be cruel to poultry!
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Star anise and honey glazed chicken, chicken masala, pouletau paprika, chicken broccoli stir fry, chicken curry, roast chicken – from gourmet to simple cuisine, from farm to table, the journey for the chickens,is a gruesome tale.
According to animal behaviourists chickens are smart, social, sensitive animals, recognizing one another, developing pecking orders, caring for their young, enjoying dust-baths and roosting in trees and even good at problem solving. Chickens raised for meat and eggs are deprived of all these activities.
Of poultry species, chicken is the most devoured in this country.The Department of Animal Production and Health (DAPH) records that Sri Lanka’s poultry population grew from 6.3 mn in 1980 to 37.2 mn in 2015, with chicken meat production which was 86.27 MT in 2005 increasing to 150.32 MT by 2014. Globally there are more chickens in the world than any other bird species, with over 50 billion raised annually for their meat and eggs.
Claiming that animal cruelty laws will purportedly affect Sri Lanka’s economy, some in the local poultry industry are demanding the exclusion of poultry from the proposed Animal Welfare Bill which introduces a comprehensive legal regime for the prevention of cruelty to ALL animals. Do they want to continue transporting chickens suffocating in boxes, stacked one atop the other, exposed to the cruel vagaries of the weather, withdraw food before slaughter to gain maximum yield and profit, confine chickens in battery cages and slaughter inhumanely, all for commercial gain? Satisfied that it is ethical and moral to expose these birds to barbarity for the industry’s profit, one even ludicrously accused the petitioners, including this columnist, in an animal welfare court case, who oppose such exclusion, of sitting on a gold mine – paid to defend these voiceless birds! Excluding poultry from the Bill will be as absurd as removing one human race from legislative protection, when all humans are sentient beings requiring equal protection.
As a Member State of the Office International des Epizooties(OIE) – World Organization for Animal Health, Sri Lanka is obliged to observe OIE welfare standards on animal transport, animal slaughter and broiler chicken production.
Here are some revelations about the chicken and egg industry – severing beak ends (which are more sensitive than human finger tips) to prevent pecking, breeding hens to produce more, faster, making bones brittle and fragile,broilers suffering leg problems which Michele Hanson referring to RSPCA footage describes thus: “By day nine, the broiler’s legs can barely keep its oversized breast off the ground. By day eleven, it is puffed up to double the size of its cousin looking like an obese nine-year-old standing on the legs of a five-year-old. By day 35 it looks more like a weightlifter on steroids”, swollen hearts unable to supply oxygen to oversized breast muscles, water and feed drugged to control parasites, overstocking and slaughtering when space becomes insufficient,swinging around by the wings and violently slamming into cages,shackling and hanging upside down, electrocution, throat slitting, scalding, “boning” by jabbing rods through nostrils of male birds, separating males and females after birth, males tossed into garbage bags to suffocate or ground up alive, hens crammed into tiny wire “battery” cages stacked on top of one another with urine and faeces draining into the cages below, dead chickens left to rot among live birds.
I recall the fearful cackle of chickens who were beheaded alive in a “registered farm” that I had to visit several times to feed some cattle saved from slaughter, until re-located in a sanctuary.
Consumer Reports highlight that antibiotic resistance in humans often stems from the animal husbandry industry and the viral hothouse conditions of the poultry sector led to bird flu; two-thirds of chickens studied were salmonella infected.
One local company boasts that its poultry industry conforms to world food safety standards – but does it conform to international animal welfare standards?
Our Animals Act and the Butchers Ordinance are not applicable to poultry, thus depriving them of even the extremely limited welfare measures that some other food animals are afforded.However, the recommendations of the petitioners in the animal welfare case to enhance these measures and apply them also to poultry are under consideration by the authorities.
As the country’s OIE Focal Point, the DAPH’s Director General has a fundamental duty to perform his functions independently to ensure that the livestock sector adheres to OIE Guidelines.
Abstaining from eating chicken (or other animal flesh) if not out of compassion, but out of concern for one’s health, consuming free range eggs, not purchasing chicken showing signs of brutal slaughter, such as broken wings,may compel the industry to show some concern to these birds.
What American author C. David Coats says in “Old Mac Donald’s FactoryFarm” is food for thought : “Isn’t man an amazing animal? He kills wildlife – birds, kangaroos, deer, all kinds of cats, coyotes, beavers, groundhogs, mice, foxes and dingoes – by the million in order to protect his domestic animals and their feed. Then he kills domestic animals by the billion and eats them. This in turn kills man by the million, because eating all those animals leads to degenerative and fatal health conditions like heart disease, kidney disease, and cancer. So then man tortures and kills millions more animals to look for cures for these diseases. Elsewhere, millions of other human beings are being killed by hunger and malnutrition because food they could eat is being used to fatten domestic animals. Meanwhile, some people are dying of sad laughter at the absurdity of man, who kills so easily and so violently, and once a year, sends out cards praying for “Peace on Earth.”
How, when and why have we lost our rich animal friendly cultural heritage of yore? Sri Lanka’s Constitution giving foremost place to Buddhism, this nation needs a culture of compassion, not a culture of cruelty.