Lagerwey Hatchery, the largest hatchery of the Netherlands, started constructing a 3,000 square meter extension to its existing hatchery facility in March. The extension will hold six new HatchCare machines – the hatcher with feed and water. The first chicks are expected to hatch in October or November 2014.
“This extension will allow us to increase capacity with 800,000 day-old chicks per week,” said Wim van de Vegte, CEO of Lagerwey Hatchery in Holland. “The investment in HatchCare to us it the next step towards a successful and bright future. It benefits our company, our customer, and the chicken itself. Immediate and ad libitum access to food and water will improve chick quality and bring a better, healthier chick to our customers. Hatching chicks in a HatchCare machine responds well to today’s demand for transparent and more animal-welfare friendly production.”
Evert Kampert, hatchery manager, Lagerwey, stated: “Together with the R&D and engineering department of HatchTech, our team has been involved from the start in research and product development activities related to HatchCare. I am impressed, that aside from the increased growth, robustness and a better health status, the birds can really hatch in a ‘stress-free environment.’ In HatchCare, there is light at chick level, loads of fresh air, and 40 percent more living space for the chicken after hatching, as they are not sitting between shells and unhatched eggs anymore. For processing, after hatch, we do not need separators and chick counters.”
