Certified Organic Chicken

If you want to eat real chicken - eat certified organic chicken

Marketed as a healthier alternative to red meat, Australians eat a staggering 400 million chickens each year. But annual food poisoning cases in Australia have soared to 2.5 million, and chicken meat has been suspected as one of the main culprits.  Certified organic chickens are emerging as the easiest way to eat real chicken, and reduce your risk of food poisoning.

Certified organic chicken: in brief

• no routine antibiotics fed to them
• less chance of harbouring antibiotic-resistant 'super-bugs' like VRE
• live twice as long so more natural growth and better flavour
• higher animal welfare standards, with more outdoor space and time, and no de-beaking

Choice quotes

"Having tried an organic chicken, I'll never eat a 'normal' chicken again. The taste is far superior and you know you're not eating some diseased bird that was kept alive with drugs." 
Dean Merlo, Brisbane-based gastronome and coffee guru

The use of antibiotics in conventional chicken farming

2/3's of the antibiotics used each year in Australia are not for humans, but to keep unhealthy farm animals alive and make them grow faster. 

Chickens are known to carry a range of bacteria, including E.coli, Salmonella and Enterococci, and these bugs are developing antibiotic resistance due to the constant low-dose medication given routinely in their feed to keep them alive and accelerate their growth.

A World Health Organisation (WHO) meeting of 70 health experts concluded in 1997 that "Resistant strains of four bacteria that cause disease in humans have been transmitted from animals to humans and shown to have consequences for human health. Theyare Salmonella, Campylobacter, Enterococci, and E.coli". The WHO has called for a reduction in the use of antibiotics in agriculture because of the risk to human health, adding that healthy animal husbandry would lessen the need for drugs which, it said, should never be used to prop up inadequate hygiene.¹

In 1999 an official report from the UK government concluded "There is a continuing threat to human health from imprudent use of antibiotics in animals", and that the "misuse and overuse of antibiotics are now threatening to undo all their early promise and success in curing disease".  The British Medical Association (BMA) has warned "The risk to human health from antibiotic resistance developing in micro-organisms is one of the major public health threats that will be face in the 21st century".²

Despite these concerns, antibiotics are still used widely by non-organic animal farmers as growth promoters or for disease suppression by routinely adding them to feed and water.

Antibiotics are not allowed to be used routinely in certified organic chickens. Instead the farmer relies on a natural system that cares for the overall wellbeing of the bird. For example, Certified Organic chicken sheds contain around 4500 birds, while intensive chicken shed may contain some 12,000 or even 25,000 birds. If an organic chicken does get sick, it can be given medication but not sold as certified organic.

Why do certified organic chickens taste so much better? They live a more natural life.

• An intensive chicken lives just 36 days, growing unnaturally rapidly  in a world of artificial lighting, growth-promoting antibiotic-laced food and water,  and possibly genetically modified feed.
• Certified Organic chickens grow at a slower, natural rate, living roughly twice as long as intensively farmed chickens.
• Certified organic chickens eat certified organic feed, grown in a way that avoids the use of chemical fertilisers, herbicides, insecticides and fungicides.  A German study in 1989 showed how chickens fed organic feed are much healthier than chickens fed conventional feed.

In the wild, jungle fowl - the ancestors of modern hens - live in small groups, and each group has a regular roosting and foraging area. Certified organic standards require that chickens are allowed to live a more natural life - use of artificial lighting to accelerate growth is prohibited, maximum allowable stocking densities are lower than in intensive systems, the chickens must have open access to pasture, where they spend around 85% of their time, no synthetic yolk colourants are allowed, and routine antibiotics and beak trimming are prohibited. 

Clive Wylie is one of Australia's leading certified organic chicken farmers. He says, "We use a holistic system aimed at maximising the overall wellbeing of the bird, not simply relying on antibiotics. The longer life with a more natural growth rate allows the flavour to properly develop in an organic chicken. You can taste the difference.

It's more expensive... why buy organic eggs and chicken?

Intensive and industrial methods of production have made chicken and eggs cheap to buy. But there has been a very high price to pay in terms of animal welfare. 

Fear and high rates of pecking at other chickens are common in female chickens. To reduce aggression, breeder flocks are kept in semi-darkness. The males often have their beaks trimmed. Every day 100,000 broiler chickens die prematurely in UK factory farms as a result of intensive methods of production. Organic farming has never adopted the close confinement methods associated with factory farming such as battery cages. For this and other reasons, the experts on farm animal welfare, the Compassion in World Farming Trust (CIWF) always advises its supporters to buy organic or free-range meat and eggs. They believe such systems have the potential to deliver far higher standards of animal welfare. CIWF say that eggs which are both free range and organic are likely to have the highest welfare standard.

Certified organic chickens are special. More and more people, like you, are choosing to buy them and their eggs. Here are just a few reasons why:

*           The birds are truly free range, with plenty of space to roam in the open air
*           They are looked after in smaller flocks with more opportunity to move around
*           This gives them better access to fresh grass and the open air
*           They are fed on a diet rich in organically grown cereals
*           The routine use of antibiotics is not allowed
*           Genetically modified feed is banned
*           Organic farming increases wildlife on farms and helps protect the environment.
*           The chickens live a healthy life, which is better for them - and better for you

It takes special care, attention to detail and real commitment to produce organic chickens and eggs. This not only results in great food, but also helps to ensure some of the highest levels of animal welfare.  Because of this they do cost a little more, but we believe that this is a price worth paying.

Paying that little bit more for organic eggs or chicken is your guarantee of the best possible animal welfare. Proving plenty of space for chickens to roam and moving their houses to fresh grass all costs the farmer more. More land is used in organic farming, which helps to protect the environment. Making sure that chickens have the best possible welfare involves more work, which provides more jobs for people.

Certified Organic farmers believe that these higher standards are in the best interests of organic farmers, their chickens - and your food. It is this commitment to improving animal welfare and producing high quality food that people can trust that increases the cost of production.

For more information about the chickens we stock at Macro Wholefoods, please visit http://www.inglewoodfarms.com/