The
national welfare codes for chickens and turkeys take effect this
week.
“The code process provides an important opportunity for advancing farm animal welfare policy in Canada,” said poultry welfare expert Dr. Ian Duncan, who represents the Canadian Federation of Humane Societies (CFHS) on the Code Committee.
“During
the recent public comment period, we received broad input from the
public, industry and other stakeholders.”
This code represents improvements in the welfare of chickens & turkeys, including:
-A shift in lighting regimens, which now require farmers to provide their birds with a minimum of four hours of dark time per day to rest (up from zero to one per day);
-New requirements for immediate veterinarian care for sick and injured birds, and
-New requirements for humane euthanasia.
While
farmers may feel the new standards are tough, the humane society
feels they are lax.
“These are reasonable standards, but we feel this code could have gone further,” says Barbara Cartwright, chief executive officer of CFHS.
“For
example, the invasive and painful practice of trimming beaks and toes
with a hot blade is still allowed, we’re only halfway to the ideal
dark time for chickens and turkeys, which is seven hours per day, and
we’ve done nothing to relieve the chronic hunger resulting from
genetic selection that causes massive appetite and rapid growth,”
she is quoted in a news release.
Ideally,
we would also further decrease the number of birds housed per square
metre.”
