In Europe's egg sector, the welfare pioneers end up paying the bill

Monday, January 2, 2012

Farmers who changed housing systems to conform with EU welfare guidelines have ended up with higher costs, while others have continued with their about-to-be-banned Eurocages

by NORMAN DUNN

European farmers who accepted the need to change animal housing systems at the start of the millennium have ended up paying heavily for their move away from dry sow stalls and battery cages for layers.

The sad fact is that, more than a decade later, the welfare pioneers are still pretty much on their own. And thousands of hog and egg producers who carried on with cheaper, and often more efficient, production systems outside European Union (EU) welfare guidelines remain in profitable production.

Stuart Agnew, a European Parliament member and poultry farmer, feels good about his high-welfare, free-range production system with 35,000 layers in eastern England. But he accepts that he's very much in the minority amongst EU egg producers. The norm for an estimated 45 per cent of the 365 million layers remains production from so-called "Eurocages" with 550 square centimetres of floor space per bird, even although the system has long faced a complete ban starting Jan. 1, 2012.

Can around 160 million layers change to alternative, legal housing systems within a couple of months? "Not a chance," said Agnew, speaking back in August 2011. The frustrating fact for farmers like him is that, under EU law, there's nothing to stop cheaper Eurocage eggs being sold in any member country, even in Britain, Sweden, Austria and Germany – countries that introduced a Eurocage ban much earlier than the rest of Europe.

Reluctantly, Agnew agrees with the John Dalli, the EU Commissioner for Health and Consumer Protection, that a Europe-wide sales ban covering eggs from such systems would also be unrealistic at this late date. "We cannot simply open the cages and wring the birds' necks on Jan. 1."

Agnew adds that destroying the eggs produced in this way would also leave a sour taste with the public when half the world isn't receiving enough food anyway.

What's really annoying for those who have changed over is that their production costs are much higher. Labour input is more. Bird health is poorer and therefore vet costs are up. In the Netherlands, independent assessments calculate that producing eggs from an on-floor system in a barn costs an average 21 per cent more than in cages.

The EU swine sector provides a mirror image of the whole debacle. Way back in 1999, the U.K. government introduced a ban on gestation stalls for the nation's dry sows.

Sweden and Finland followed later on. Here too, labour costs shot up and, on average, sow performance fell. The result was that pork and bacon from these countries was, and remains, a good 20 per cent more expensive than the meat from areas where sows are still kept in stalls.

Then the EU parliament announced that all swine producers should adopt loose housing for their dry sows. A deadline for a complete EU stall ban was set for Jan. 1, 2013.

Surprise, surprise! With just 13 months to go at time of writing, well over 50 per cent of sow units in southern European countries haven't even started to change over. Efforts are being made in the north, however. By mid-2011, the Danish swine sector claimed that 70 per cent of its sows were now loose-housed. In the Netherlands, the information now is that 80 per cent of sow keepers have changed and that 20 per cent of those remaining with the old system are aiming to give up hog production anyway before 2013.

But, as the British National Pig Association warned earlier this year, "Many countries have hardly started to think about changing." The result? A completely distorted pork market throughout Europe.

As for eggs, Stuart Agnew sees consumer campaigns as the one tool offering eventual justice to welfare pioneers. Over the past few years, a growing number of major supermarket chains in Sweden, Britain, Germany and the Netherlands have agreed to ban eggs from Eurocages from their shelves. This is at least helping to keep prices buoyant for eggs from alternative systems, such as on-floor (deep litter with nesting boxes and perches) and free-range.

Still comparatively popular – mainly in Germany, the Netherlands and Sweden – are alternative cage systems introduced as so-called "enriched cages" for 20-60 birds per cage. These were billed as incorporating the health and hygiene aspects of the Eurocage system and the welfare of on-floor flock management. They feature more floor space – about 750 square centimetres per bird – along with darkened nesting boxes, perches and sanded scratching areas.

But two developments have already rocked the boat here. One, the egg grading system used throughout the EU has no separate code for the larger enriched cages. This means that farmers who have invested heavily in enriched cages – an estimated six million birds have changed over in Germany alone at a cost of around €150 million (C$205 million), according to the farmers union there – find their eggs can still only be retailed under the general "cage-produced" code at the lowest price.

Secondly, welfare groups have made it plain that they want to phase out all cages, including enriched ones, for layers. Already, purchase of new enriched cages is banned in Germany and a total ban has been chalked-in there for 2017. Government has since relented and suggested that 2020 might be a fairer deadline.

Whatever happens in this instance, it's clear that the enriched cage pioneers will also end up paying heavily for their early investment in the future. BF

Norman Dunn writes about European agriculture from Germany.