Free range eggs - you can't win
"The growing popularity of free-range eggs ironically means chooks are getting less space" The Age
I have been trying to do my bit and buy just free-range eggs these days, but no doubt like most people I am also not buying the top of the range in free range eggs. I buy the house brand ones. But I have noticed that there are fewer and fewer (if any) cage laid, or even barn laid available in your local supermarket. They are now almost all free range. Coles, in fact now makes the claim that none of their home-brand eggs are cage laid. I do know that caged egg farms are pretty horrible. I vaguely remember, as a teacher, taking our class to a chicken farm and seeing how crowded the sheds were - the hens could barely move and the smell was not good. There was a lot of fuss about them, and then they moved to barn laid, which meant that the hens were just in a big space crammed together rather than in a cage. So free range is better - right? Well what does free range mean? It seems that in 2016, after a lot of argument, a national standard was laid down - 10,000 hens per hectare (1 per square metre) outside with 'regular and meaningful' (whatever that means) access to this outside. The farmers were apparently wanting 20,000 per hectare. There are various other things but this is the basis. They do say that some packaging states the density - indeed I think it is supposed to - must have a look next time I buy some.
The new standard has meant that the big producers can produce free-range eggs at an affordable price for the majority of people. Yes - I know - if you are really poor you can probably only afford cage laid. Nevertheless the fact is that the majority of eggs now bought in supermarkets - judging by what is on the shelves - is free range. But as the quote at the top states it actually means that most free-range hens now have less space because previously the big farmers were probably not into free-range. Originally it was small producers who produced free-range eggs, and they have an outside density of 1,500 hens per hectare (or even less) - way less than the national standard. But this is the standard that the RSPCA and Choice like. And some producers still stick to it - Kangaroo Island for example.
Not only do they have more space, but they also have protection from the weather as well, whereas it is said that the big producers just have big paddocks with little or no shelter. But of course the small producers produce less eggs.
Another problem with the new standard is that you can't make the hens go outside. Mostly they are kept in large sheds in pretty close proximity to each other - the one shown below is one of Coles' producers. I think the ruling is that the hens have to be within 9 or is it 7 metres of an exit to the outside, but (a) that is not that close and (b) you can't force them to go outside and apparently the majority stay inside all the time. Impossible to know whether this is by choice or because they just can't get to the exit. One of the 'green' articles maintained that they were 'trained' to stay inside by closing the exits when they were first put in the shed. It is believed that many of them, in fact, do not go outside. The smell and the noise is still pretty awful.
The article about the Coles farms said that Woolworths would not give them access to their farms, so I cannot speak for them. So what do you do? The smaller producers with the very low number of hens per hectare, simply cannot meet the demand, and they also charge a whole lot more - thus putting them out of the reach of the poor and even the moderately well-off. Mmm, that last statement is probably not true - I, for example, could afford to pay $7.00 and up for a dozen eggs, but it's an extravagance that I choose not to go for and, indeed, if we did all choose it there would simply not be enough to meet demand. It's a bit of a catch 22.
It's a compromise is it not between spending more on your food and being humane. The poor cannot afford to be humane - they just need good cheap food - and there's nothing wrong with the quality of the eggs. Well - again - those batting for the low density, free-range - and also dare I say, organic - hens would say they taste better, but I suspect that unless you keep your own chooks in the backyard, there probably isn't a lot of taste difference - not to to an ungourmet person like me anyway. And if you keep your own chooks you've got to worry about the foxes.
Another problem with the large free range farms the 'greenies' say, is that the manure produced by the chickens outside is so great that it is getting into the waterways and spoiling the environment. I would have thought it was relatively easy to collect it and process it - maybe not even process it - and sell it for garden manure. It's very good for the garden.
Then there's the problem of what to do with the male chicks (don't ask) and the hens when they are getting too old to lay. The 'better' egg farms would have these problems too surely. And very possibly the same solutions.
Oh dear - it seems I shouldn't just be a vegetarian - I really should be vegan! It's all just too hard I'm afraid and I ease my conscience by just not thinking about it - which is despicable really. I will keep buying free range though.
