NEW RULES FOR CONVENTIONAL LAYING HENS

Is it fair on organic egg producers that their conventional counterparts have just been given E16 million by the State? The E16 million was given to conventional poultry farmers to help them adjust their laying hen housing regime. Is this a trade distortion?

(pic: not a conventional laying hen ,even with the new regulations...)

According to the Department of Agriculture Food and the Marine “Council Directive 1999/74/EC on minimum standards for the protection of laying hens states that, from 1 January 2012, the rearing of laying hens in conventional (known as 'unenriched') cages will be prohibited in the EU. From 1 January 2012, laying hens are only allowed to be reared in enriched cages or using alternative systems such as barn or free range”.

“The Poultry Welfare Scheme was introduced on 16 June 2010...and provided grant-aid at a rate of 40 % for the conversion to enriched cages, free range or barn systems”.

So the supports for conversion to a new animal management regime have been significant. And in general, anyone who favours higher animal welfare standards will welcome this change, a change spearheaded by a slow but steady shift towards ethical consumption.

The 1999 element of the EU regulation refers to the year the regulation was passed. The regulation, as the name suggests, was passed to improve the welfare standards of laying hens. So since then, the only egg producers who were actually compliant with the regulation have been some barn and all free range and organic producers. Because these producers had these higher animal welfare standards, their costs were also higher. And because of this, consumers who wanted to support these higher standards had to pay more for their eggs.

The Department has decided to give specific supports including a once off payment of E16 million, to the farmers who were not compliant with the regulation. Producers who were compliant with this regulation have received no special funds.

All this time, organic producers have had tiny markets, partly because it cost so much more for organic eggs, but also because of higher feed costs. A half dozen organic eggs retail for between E2 and E2.50.

When queried about the long timeframe, the Department responded: “The Directive provided that farmers and operators be given a long transitional period to adjust to this measure.”

They also said: “The awarding of support for the expansion of existing compliant production systems would not be permitted under State Aid rules/Directives and may in fact be seen as a trade distorting subsidy.”

But is this actually the case? Surely trade is distorted by the granting of extra supports to one category over another, as has happened? This situation is compounded by the fact that the ones who did not receive the supports were actually compliant with the higher standards all along. It thus acts like a penalty for good behaviour.

More and more of this legislation is coming down stream from the EU: on pesticides, on biodiversity, on water quality and more. In most if not all cases, organic farmers and growers are already compliant. Yet there is no specific reward for this. Consumers are asked to self-tax, to charge themselves more of their ever dwindling cash to do the right thing. Organic farmers are accused of being overly expensive, elitist and out of touch.

States have a choice: support the best practices or support the bulk of the existing producers. The French state has recently decided to put much of its resources into supporting organic, especially in the area of public procurement, Will the Irish state do anything similar? While there is always hope, it is highly unlikely.

Next post, we will take a closer look at the specifics of organic egg production, and why, even with these new, higher animal welfare standards for all laying hens, it still makes sense to choose organic eggs.

eggs laying hens organic poultry

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