Broiler Directive

Environment Food and Rural Affairs written statement – made at on 10 May 2007.

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Photo of Ben Bradshaw Ben Bradshaw Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs) (Local Environment, Marine and Animal Welfare)

On 7 May European Union (EU) Ministers agreed a Directive which for the first time establishes rules governing the conditions under which meat chickens are kept. The package of new measures includes detailed requirements for holdings where meat chickens are kept, the introduction of a maximum stocking density limit, data collection and scientific monitoring of impacts on chicken welfare, training for the industry and a possible new welfare labelling regime following a report from the European Commission. The Directive will come into force in 2010.

The welfare of meat chickens is a major concern to people in the United Kingdom and throughout the EU. This is a major sector of livestock production with some 850 million meat chickens produced in the UK every year and 4 billion across the EU. It is therefore only right that we set harmonised welfare rules for these animals.

It has taken nearly two years of negotiations to reach this point and Germany must be congratulated on concluding the Directive during their Presidency of the Council of Ministers. Some member states would have liked to further water down the proposals in respect of the maximum stocking density limit but the UK successfully fought off this challenge with support from other strongly minded welfare countries.

The Directive provides a platform on which to build as well as sending a clear message to the rest of the world that the we and the EU care about animal welfare.