Thursday, May 20, 2021
Late decision in a double sense
“Chick shredding” is still banned
Around 40 million male chicks are killed every year in Germany – because they are superfluous for egg production. That should change today. The Bundestag wants to resolve the controversial practice. There are already alternatives.
The massive killing of male chicks in laying hen breeding should be banned in Germany from the beginning of 2022. Agricultural Minister Julia Klöckner’s legislative plans, which the Bundestag should pass after years of struggle, provide for this. Instead, it should then be possible to use methods on a broad front to identify the sex in the egg and prevent male chicks from hatching in the first place. The decision will not only come late (the vote is planned after 10 p.m.), but also late in the legislative period. And not just from the point of view of animal rights activists: the end of the controversial practice in the black-red coalition agreement was planned for 2019.
From the beginning of 2024, only methods that work earlier when the eggs are incubated should be allowed. This is to avoid pain for the embryo. “As Minister for Germany, I can make decisions and guarantee that there will be no more eggs produced from Germany, where chick killing is a practice. We will forbid that for German companies,” said Klöckner in the “early start” of ntv.
In Germany, more than 40 million male chicks are routinely killed shortly after hatching each year because they do not lay eggs and do not set as much meat. Often there is talk of “shredding”, but the animals are usually killed with gas. The Federal Administrative Court ruled in 2019 that animal welfare issues outweigh economic interests and declared the practice to be permissible only for a transitional period. The Animal Welfare Association recently demanded that the “long overdue end” of chick killing should not be softened, but that it should finally be written down. In the black-red coalition agreement there is an end until 2019.
40 million chicks killed mostly with gas
Klöckner told the German Press Agency that the ban was a milestone for animal welfare. “This makes us pioneers worldwide.” With a view to the possible rising prices for consumers, Klöckner said: “An egg will be a few cents more expensive, but we notice it again and again in consumer surveys: Consumers tell us that more animal welfare is worth more to them.”
At the same time, the farms were supported with “many millions of euros” in research funds so that the hatcheries could identify the sex in the egg early on and the male eggs would not be hatched in the first place. Klöckner said: “We enable our companies in Germany to stay here and do business, but also to put an end to this practice.”
In Germany, more than 40 million male chicks are routinely killed shortly after hatching each year because they do not lay eggs and do not set as much meat. Sometimes there is talk of “shredding”, but the animals are usually killed with gas. The Federal Administrative Court decided in 2019 that animal welfare issues outweigh economic interests and declared the practice to be permissible only for a transitional period. The Animal Welfare Association recently demanded that the “long overdue end” of chick killing should not be softened, but that it should finally be written down.
A real increase in animal welfare could only bring about a move away from high-performance breeding and the promotion of dual-purpose chickens, explained the association – female chicks should lay eggs, male chicks are raised for fattening. The FDP agricultural politician Gero Hocker warned against going it alone on a national level. “In the future, even more products from abroad will end up on our shelves. We will then lose more and more influence on production conditions such as animal welfare.” An EU-wide ban on the killing of chicks is necessary.
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