Call on the hatchery industry to abolish chick crushing and suffocation

When it comes to slaughter of chicks immediately after birth, many people think of the slaughter of male egg-layers. However, not only chickens for eggs but also chickens for meat (broilers) are slaughtered immediately after birth.

Even at the hatchery of broiler chickens, immature chicks, chicks with egg yolk stuck on their bodies, chicks with dirty belly buttons, and chicks with bad or inflamed legs are killed that day.

Chicks are born at hatcheries every day; the number of chicks killed in Japan per day is estimated to be about 260,000 for egg-layer chickens and about 21,000 for broiler chickens*. As methods of killing these chicks, it is widely practiced to stuff them from the top and killing them by suffocation or crushing. The bodies get piled up more and more from the top, and the chicks keep getting more crushed, and they get soaked from the body heat among the chicks. They don’t die immediately; it slowly leads to death.

Chicks stuffed in a bucket. A hatchery in Japan:

When Japan Poultry Breeders & Hatcheries Association was questioned about this issue, they responded, “Each member company is working from their own standpoint, and the association does not have a unified policy.” So then, when 15 companies among the domestic hatcheries were questioned about this issue, the results were as follows.

Fukuda Chicken Farm Co., Ltd., Yonekyu Delicious Chicken Co., Ltd., Iwamura Poultry Co., Ltd., Tomaru Co., Ltd., Kanto Co., Ltd.	No answer (No answer even when urged), including one company that responded “We discarded the questionnaire; we will not answer”
2 companies	Please ask Japan Poultry Breeders & Hatcheries Association
1 company	We can’t do anything because we follow Japan Poultry Breeders & Hatcheries Association
1 company	We are acting in collaboration with “Japan Chicken Association” and “Japan Poultry Breeders & Hatcheries Association”
1 company	We believe it would be good for the Japan Poultry Breeders & Hatcheries Association to establish a policy on the chick slaughter method that complies with the law. Perhaps it’s necessary to subsidize the introduction cost of the slaughter equipment.
1 company	Considering introduction of gas slaughter in the future
1 company	Aware of the issue, but have not been able to act
1 company	We’d like information on chick slaughter equipment using gas.
1 company	Animal welfare is not relevant to the hatchery. There is no problem with crushing. There is no money to introduce gas slaughter. It can’t be helped because they are economic animals. Everyone is doing it.
1 company	Currently slaughtering by gas. (Note by ARCJ: the method is unknown) When asked if the slaughter method could be shared within the industry, “We can’t because our company’s information will be leaked.”

In response to these answers, on 2021/2/11, we submitted the following request to the Japan Breeders & Hatcheries Association.

Request

Dear Japan Breeders & Hatcheries Association,

We request the following three points regarding the slaughter of newly-born chicks (egg-layer and broiler chicks), which we have been communicating with since August 2020.

Clarify both within and outside of the association the policy of abolishing the current inhumane culling methods of chicks such as death by crushing or suffocation and switching to humane culling methods that comply with laws and regulations.
Collect knowledge from overseas about more humane slaughter methods for chicks and information on slaughter equipment overseas, and share that information among members.
Based on the collected information, begin efforts to shift to more humane culling of chicks.

Chicks with standing difficulties and weak chicks are also slaughtered soon after they are born.

The 2 photos below are from a hatchery overseas. AndrewSkowron / OpenCages

The cover photo is from another hatchery overseas: Farm Transparency Project Eggs Exposed Male chicks shredded alive at the hatchery

* The number of chicken chicks hatched (results of data collection and survey of chicken chicks hatched) estimated from the number of fed chickens in the documentation of Japan Breeders & Hatcheries Association