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Caged farming - a nightmare we can end
Caged farming affects billions of animals worldwide. These animals, including pigs, hens, rabbits, ducks, geese, and quail, spend their lives confined in tiny, cramped cages, unable to perform natural behaviours. This inhumane practice not only causes immense suffering but also raises serious ethical concerns about how we treat sentient beings.
Globally, caged farming is a massive issue, with the EU alone confining around 300 million farmed animals in cages annually. In the UK, approximately 8 million farmed animals endure these cruel conditions each year. Despite progress in moving towards cage-free systems, millions of animals still suffer daily. It’s time to finally end this cruel and unnecessary practice. It’s time to End The Cage Age.
Clucking hell: hens in cages
Although 80% of UK eggs are from cage-free systems, the remaining 20% are provided by 8 million caged hens each year. These hens, confined in “enriched” cages, have little more space than a sheet of A4 paper. They can't forage in the dirt, dustbathe, see the light of day or fully stretch their wings. This causes immense physical discomfort and mental anguish which can result in harmful behaviours such as feather pecking.
The UK claims to have some of the highest farmed animal welfare standards. But when it comes to ending the cage age for laying hens, we are falling behind some European countries:
- Luxembourg is 100% cage-free.
- France banned the installation of new cage systems in 2018.
- Austria eliminated all caged systems in 2020.
- Germany will be completely cage-free by 2026.
- The Czech Republic plans to ban all cage systems by 2027.
If these countries can commit to ending the cage age for hens, why can’t we?
Do you want all eggs produced in the UK to be cage-free? It takes less than 2 minutes to email Steve Reed, the new Secretary of State for Defra, to ask him to End the Cage Age for hens.
Mother pigs or production units?
In the UK, around 200,000 mother pigs, or 60% of sows, are confined in cramped metal crates two or three times a year for up to five weeks at a time. These farrowing crates are so restrictive that the pigs cannot turn around or nuzzle their young, leading to severe physical and mental suffering.
Sows are intelligent and social animals, naturally inclined to build nests for their families, and so experience extreme stress and frustration when unable to do so. After having an average of 3-5 litters, they are sent to slaughter at just a few years old.
Sign the petition to end farrowing crates for mother pigs in the UK.
Other ways you can help End The Cage Age
We need your help to keep up this momentum. Here’s how you can join the fight:
- Make a donation to Compassion today
- Download our cage-free Communities guide for tips on encouraging convenience stores in your area to go cage-free.
Got questions on caged farming?
Battery cages hold several birds with a floor space per bird smaller than the area of an ordinary A4 sheet of paper. The cage is usually bare except for food and water and has a sloping wire mesh floor so that the eggs roll away onto a conveyor belt to be collected automatically. However, barren battery cages have been banned in the UK and the EU since 2012.
So called “enriched” cages were developed when barren battery cages were banned. They only provide a small amount of extra space per bird (than compared to battery cages). They can allow hens to express more of their natural behaviours, such as perching, scratching, and nesting.
However, the design of the cages means these behaviours are still very restricted. The perches are very low - just a few inches from the cage floor - so hens cannot fly up to a high perch to be safe from feather pecking. The litter area is often very limited, and dust bathing is impossible. The ‘nest’ consists of plastic sheets hanging down from the top of the cage, which creates a more secluded area for egg laying.
One of the key reasons cages are still used for egg laying hens is because they are cost-effective, and transitioning to a cage-free system can be expensive. However, as consumers increasingly demand cage-free eggs (80% of UK eggs now come from cage-free systems), a growing number of companies are pledging to remove cages from their supply chains.
Broilers are a type of chicken farmed for meat. Chickens farmed for eggs are called egg-laying hens.
In barn systems, hens are kept in sheds using the floor space only. Some have several levels of platforms or perches, which are called aviaries.
This allows the hens much greater freedom of movement than possible in caged systems. They can stretch, flap their wings and fly. They can also perform other natural behaviours such as pecking, scratching and laying their eggs in a nest.
In free-range systems, hens are housed in barns or aviaries but they also have constant daytime access to an outside range with vegetation. In the UK each hen must have at least 4 square metres of outside space (in non-rotational systems).
Organic systems also provide outdoor access. Organic farms certified by the Soil Association, must provide additional space; each hen has a minimum of 10 square metres of outside space and beak trimming is not allowed.
Sows are adult female pigs that have given birth to at least one litter of piglets. Young adult female pigs that have not yet had a litter are called gilts.
Shortly before she is due to give birth (referred to as ‘farrowing’), a sow is typically moved to a farrowing crate. These were originally designed to reduce the risk of sows crushing their piglets by limiting their movement, particularly as they lie down.
However, farrowing crates limit sows’ most basic behaviours; they are unable to turn around, walk, nest build or interact properly with their piglets. In addition, there is a higher risk of piglets being stillborn or harmed by their mothers (especially for first-time mothers), and piglet behaviour is severely restricted due to the barren environment.
There are alternative farrowing systems to the crate including individual farrowing pens, individual temporary crates, or group systems. Both provide commercially viable options in terms of production parameters and operator safety and represent better options for sow and piglet welfare potential.
