British Food Journal Volume 66 Issue 5 1964

Abstract

The rearing of food animals by intensive factory methods has received a great deal of publicity in recent months. This has induced the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food to set up a technical committee to examine the conditions in which livestock are raised and kept under systems of intensive husbandry, and to advise if standards should be set in the interests of their welfare. He announced this in Parliament on April 20 and hoped soon to name the chairman and other members of the committee. The committee will quickly note that most criticism has been directed at what many regard as inhumane methods, most of this coming from the heart rather than the head. Battery hens, fooled by changing periods of electric light, have increased their laying and since the broiler industry exploded into the food market only a few years ago, the small seasonal trade has become an all‐the‐year round trade of 100 million birds, a prodigious output that is still rising. This mass production of white meat had already made similar strides in the U.S.A. and a few continental countries a few years previously. Its commercial success, however, is undoubtedly due to the economics of the trade; that it is possible to sell poultry of relatively small size and uniform quality as cheap, or even cheaper, than butchers' meat. All this tends to encourage the application of the same intensive methods of production in the meat trade. Anything that can increase the amount of first‐class animal protein in a world rapidly growing short of it and at lower prices merits more than a sentimental appraisal.

Citation

(1964), "British Food Journal Volume 66 Issue 5 1964", British Food Journal, Vol. 66 No. 5, pp. 55-70. https://doi.org/10.1108/eb011625