Chick-shredding ordeal shocks unprepared staff

By ANNE BESTON environment reporter

Staff at a chicken factory were ill-prepared for the job of destroying thousands of newly hatched chicks in a Machine, investigators say.

A Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry inquiry found that the Tegel Foods factory staff were "insufficiently prepared for the unpleasantness of the task" of feeding 5000 tiny chicks into a shredder.

But the inquiry also concluded that Tegel had done nothing illegal. The use of the machine was not against any law governing animal welfare.

The factory in New Plymouth had recently changed from a broiler chicken operation to a hatchery as part of a reorganisation of Tegel operations, and staff were not used to killing healthy birds.

A staff member made an anonymous complaint about the "maceration" machine but other staff were also concerned, said SPCA national council member Peg Loague.

Staff were also worried about the arrival of a bigger "maceration" or "instant fragmentation" machine over the next few days as part of the change in operations at New Plymouth, Mrs Loague said.

The Tegel employees had been used to killing chicks which were "not viable" or sick, but the hatchery operation meant thousands more day-old male chicks would have to be destroyed because they would not be needed for egg laying.

MAF and the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals were asked to investigate.

David Bayvel, MAF's director of animal welfare, said use of the machine was not against the law.

But the company, which stopped killing chicks during the investigation, would now put time into staff training, he said.

Mrs Loague said "instant fragmentation" was recognised as the most humane way to kill the up to 2.5 million day-old male chicks destroyed each year because the industry had no use for them.

"It isn't pleasant for people to see and it isn't pleasant to hear about," she said.

"I find it horrible myself.

"My job, however, is to advocate for what is least distressing to animals and at the present time maceration is the least distressing method available to kill unwanted chicks," said Mrs Loague.

Videotape of the process aired on television showed dozens of chicks being tipped on to a series of steel chutes that took them to a conveyor belt feeding the machine, which was hidden behind a curtain.

Mrs Loague said the chicks dropped on to rapidly spinning blades.

Death was thought to take less than one-tenth of a second.

The process is used internationally to destroy unwanted male chicks in the poultry industry and is approved in New Zealand by MAF, the SPCA, the New Zealand Veterinary Association and the National Animal Welfare Advisory Committee.

The committee is an independent advisory body to the Minister of Agriculture and includes representatives from Federated Farmers and consumer groups.

Wellington SPCA animal welfare manager Hans Kriek said slaughter of male chicks by "maceration" was highly efficient, but that was probably not what was making New Zealanders squirm.

"The industry calls them 'hatchery waste' - that typifies factory farming in New Zealand.

"In some ways you could say the male chicks are the lucky ones - they don't end up in a battery cage," said Mr Kriek.

"But the question is whether it's ethical to slaughter 2.5 million chicks per year. From a wider point of view, I don't think it should be accepted."

Save Animals from Exploitation spokesman Gary Reese said the slaughter of chicks, de-beaking of hens and the conditions in which battery hens lived (most have space equivalent to an A4 piece of paper) were the "well-hidden practices of factory farming."

"People hadn't anticipated being so horrified and are asking 'is it moral' and 'is it ethical,' and they're feeling, 'no, it's not.'

"New Zealanders intuitively know we shouldn't be killing animals for anything other than vital needs," said Mr Reese.

Tegel's North Island operations manager, Bill Williams, said last night that killing would resume given the positive findings of the investigation.