The Environmental and Animal Society of Taiwan yesterday urged the government to ban building more henhouses with cages and begin a 10-year transition to cage-free status to improve animal welfare in line with international standards.
The society this year examined eggs sold through outlets of Taiwan’s four major retailers.
PX Mart Co underperformed the most in animal welfare, as nearly 80 percent of eggs available at its stores nationwide were cage-raised, it said.
Photo Courtesy Of Changhua County Government
PX Mart also went back on RT-Mart International Ltd’s cage-free egg commitments made in 2021 after acquiring the company and rebranding it as Mega PX Mart in August, causing its cage-free eggs to decline from 37 percent in 2021 to 7.14 percent this year, the report said.
Carrefour Taiwan pledged to source 100 percent cage-free eggs by the end of this year, but only its upscale supermarket chain Mia C’bon has achieved the goal, it said.
Its budget hypermarkets and supermarkets were halfway toward the goal, and whether the pledge would be fulfilled after it was taken over by Uni-President Group remained to be seen, the report said.
Costco Taiwan is moving toward the goal of 100 percent cage-free eggs set by US-based Costco Wholesale Corp last year, but its 48 percent achievement this year lagged far behind its South Korean counterpart’s 100 percent, it said.
City’super Taiwan, a Hong Kong upscale supermarket chain funded and operated by Far Eastern Group, in 2018 set the target of sourcing 100 percent cage-free eggs by this year and has achieved about 50 percent, the report said.
However, the company quietly removed the pledge originally published on its official Web site and refused to reply to queries from the society and animal rights groups based in Hong Kong, it said.
Society deputy executive director Chen Yu-min (陳玉敏) said that cage rearing ruins hens’ physical and mental health, and many countries are planning to abolish the approach, particularly since the EU implemented a ban in 2012.
Western countries such as Switzerland, Finland and Germany, as well as 10 US states, have banned cage rearing, while Asian countries including South Korea, Thailand and the Philippines have adopted regulations to promote industrial cage-free transition, she said.
About 75 percent of egg farms in Taiwan still use cage rearing. The biggest production line is in Changhua County, where eggs with excessive levels of the pesticide fipronil sulfone were identified two weeks ago, Chen said.
Some egg farmers would secretly spray the pesticide at henhouses with cages to prevent hens from ceasing egg laying due to illness, as the tight spaces and accumulated bodily waste make it impossible for them to move freely and clean themselves, she said.
Chen called for substituting cage-free floor systems — also known as barn systems — for cage rearing, as the manure at such systems would become sandy, lose its odor and can be processed into organic fertilizers.
Switching from cage rearing to barn systems can reduce costs not only because the total manure weight would decline by about 80 percent, but also because the land area required for flat floor housing would be only half of the henhouses with cages used for the 40 million hens nationwide, she said.
Research from the society showed that barn-laid eggs are not as expensive as imagined, as they cost about NT$7 to NT$13 each at retail outlets, Chen said, adding that some cage-reared eggs are even more expensive.
The government should follow the international trend of phasing out cage rearing by banning constructing or expanding henhouses with cages as soon as possible, and set a 100 percent cage-free egg target over the next decade, Chen said.
It should assist egg farmers with technological transformation and require retail giants to stick with their targets of zero cage-reared eggs, she added.
ALIGNED THINKING: Taiwan and Japan have a mutual interest in trade, culture and engineering, and can work together for stability, Cho Jung-tai said Taiwan and Japan are two like-minded countries willing to work together to form a “safety barrier” in the Indo-Pacific region, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) yesterday said at the opening ceremony of the 35th Taiwan-Japan Modern Engineering and Technology Symposium in Taipei. Taiwan and Japan are close geographically and closer emotionally, he added. Citing the overflowing of a barrier lake in the Mataian River (馬太鞍溪) in September, Cho said the submersible water level sensors given by Japan during the disaster helped Taiwan monitor the lake’s water levels more accurately. Japan also provided a lot of vaccines early in the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic,
Kaohsiung Mayor Chen Chi-mai (陳其邁) on Monday announced light shows and themed traffic lights to welcome fans of South Korean pop group Twice to the port city. The group is to play Kaohsiung on Saturday as part of its “This Is For” world tour. It would be the group’s first performance in Taiwan since its debut 10 years ago. The all-female group consists of five South Koreans, three Japanese and Tainan’s Chou Tzu-yu (周子瑜), the first Taiwan-born and raised member of a South Korean girl group. To promote the group’s arrival, the city has been holding a series of events, including a pop-up
TEMPORAL/SPIRITUAL: Beijing’s claim that the next Buddhist leader must come from China is a heavy-handed political maneuver that will fall flat-faced, experts said China’s requirement that the Dalai Lama’s reincarnation to be born in China and approved by Beijing has drawn criticism, with experts at a forum in Taipei yesterday saying that if Beijing were to put forth its own Dalai Lama, the person would not be recognized by the Tibetan Buddhist community. The experts made a remarks at the two-day forum hosted by the Tibet Religious Foundation of His Holiness the Dalai Lama titled: “The Snow Land Forum: Finding Common Ground on Tibet.” China says it has the right to determine the Dalai Lama’s reincarnation, as it claims sovereignty over Tibet since ancient times,
Temperatures in some parts of Taiwan are expected to fall sharply to lows of 15°C later this week as seasonal northeasterly winds strengthen, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said today. It is to be the strongest cold wave to affect northern Taiwan this autumn, while Chiayi County in the southwest and some parts of central Taiwan are likely to also see lower temperatures due to radiational cooling, which occurs under conditions of clear skies, light winds and dry weather, the CWA said. Across Taiwan, temperatures are to fall gradually this week, dropping to 15°C to 16°C in the early hours of Wednesday
RSS