Egg sexing recognized at Good Farm Animal Welfare Awards

Compassion in World Farming’s Good Farm Animal Welfare Awards recognized chicken and egg producers across the globe for efforts to raise animal production practices.

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The Seleggt team was recognized for its work that has the potential to totally eradicate the culling of male chicks across the egg industry. From left: Carmen Uphoff, assistant to Seleggt GmbH’s managing director; project head Martijn Haarman; and head of endocrinological research Almuth Einspanier. | Courtesy CIWF
The Seleggt team was recognized for its work that has the potential to totally eradicate the culling of male chicks across the egg industry. From left: Carmen Uphoff, assistant to Seleggt GmbH’s managing director; project head Martijn Haarman; and head of endocrinological research Almuth Einspanier. | Courtesy CIWF

The Best Innovation Award and the Best Marketing Award went to companies active in the poultry industry at this year’s Good Farm Animal Welfare Awards, organized by Compassion in World Farming (CIWF).

The Best Innovation Award was awarded to Germany’s Seleggt, for its work addressing the killing of male chicks in the egg industry, while the Best Marketing went to Dutch animal- and eco-friendly farm Kipster. The event also saw the presentation of 14 Good Egg Awards and three Good Chicken Awards, among others

Innovation Award

CIWF gave its Innovation Award to Seleggt GmbH for its work that “has the potential to totally eradicate the culling of make chicks across the egg industry.”

Seleggt has developed an endocrinological method for identifying the sex of hatching eggs before the embryo develops the capacity to feel pain, and allows male and unfertilized eggs to be humanely rejected and turned into feed.

The result of a joint venture between one of Germany’s largest retailers, Rewe Group, Dutch incubation technology company HatchTech and the University of Leipzig, the Seleggt process sees eggs incubated in the setter for nine days and then candled. A minimal amount of allantois fluid is extracted from the fertilized eggs using a fine needle. The drops of fluid are deposited on a patented marker which shows whether the hatching egg is male or female by changing color.

The technology has undergone successful tests under normal hatchery conditions since last fall.

Seleggt director, Dr. Ludger Breloh, commenting on the technology, said: “The scientific work to develop a solution for the issue of male chick culling has been 10 years in the making, but we have now developed a prototype adaptable to very large and very small hatcheries and plan to be working in a commercial hatchery in 2019.”

Marketing Award

The Best Marketing Award this year was won by Dutch egg producer Kipster, which also won a Good Egg Award. Both accolades were awarded for having developed the “world’s first carbon-neutral egg.”

 The company’s innovative farm is designed to address animal welfare and sustainability concerns, while still delivering an affordable product for consumers.

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The solar panel-clad Kispter farm produces carbon-neutral eggs in a welfare-friendly environment. | Mark Clements

Good Egg, Good Chicken

Among other winners of the Good Egg Awards this year was Swiss concern Nestle. It has set a global goal to source only cage-free shell eggs and eggs used as ingredients by 2025. In Europe and the U.S., the company will make the transition even earlier, by the end of 2020.

Nestle Europe, Middle East and North Africa’s head of corporate communication and government affairs Bart Vandewaetere said: “Our efforts focus on encouraging changes in the supply chain that bring this about in an efficient way. Our aim is that consumers around the world are able to choose affordable, higher-welfare-standard food products. We are determined to work with others to help make this happen.”

France’s Danone won two awards this year. Having committed to source exclusively cage-free eggs and egg ingredients globally in 2019, the company won a Good Egg Award.

The Danone ELN (Early Life Nutrition) division was the recipient of a Good Chicken Award for its commitment to improve broiler welfare across its entire European supply chain.

Agnes Baudet, supplier quality and food safety director at Danone ELN said: “Improving animal welfare is one of the key pillars in our sustainability strategy.

“We work hand in hand with our suppliers and CIWF to gradually improve welfare standards on our farms. After receiving a Good Egg Award last year, the Good Chicken Award is an important step in confirming that close co-operation with producers and farmers enables successful transformation, which is beneficial to animals, for our farmers, and our consumers, who can be reassured in their sustainable choices while buying our baby food products.”

Not only large companies with a global reach were prize recipients. French start-up Poulehouse also received recognition in this year’s awards for its “eggs that don’t kill hens.” The company, which sells organic eggs, does not slaughter its hens at end of lay, but sends them to fully funded “retirement homes,” and was recognized for its unique commitment to laying hen welfare.

 

Animal welfare in China

CIWF has also been running an awards program specifically for China in partnership with the International Cooperation Committee of Animal Welfare (ICCAW).

These awards are based on criteria that equate to stars, with five being the highest recognition.

This year, there were five Good Egg Production Award winners, of which three companies achieved five stars. Seven companies won Good Chicken Production Awards, again with three achieving five stars.

Winners in this latest edition ranged from large subsidiaries of well-known companies operating globally, including Charoen Popkhand and Cargill, to Shangdong Fengxiang, one of China’s largest chicken companies.

One of this year’s three-star winners of a Good Chicken Production Award was Nantong Chia Tai Livestock & Poultry Co. Ltd, recognized for rearing its birds on litter at a maximum stocking density of 30kg/m2 and for implementing a leg health plan across its farms.

 

 

CO2-neutral egg farm opens in the Netherlands

www.WATTAgNet.com/articles/32338

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