FDBusiness.com

Survey results reveal that almost 70 per cent of consumers require in-depth egg box data. Specifically, they want to know whether their eggs originate from free range hens, caged hens or barn hens, plus information on their country of origin.

This survey was carried out on charity group Four Paws’ request. “If it doesn’t specify on the ingredient list that the eggs are free-range or barn, you can assume they are likely to have come from battery eggs”, said group representative Angelique Davies.

According to Davies, much of the EU is still keeping its hens in cages. “Cages still severely restrict the movement and natural behaviour of the hens…and the additional usable space provided for each bird is only equivalent to the size of a mobile phone”, she added.

“While Italy and Greece continue to flout the EU Welfare of Laying Hens legislation and some countries met the legislation by enriching existing conventional cages, British producers have gone a step further to ensure that all cage-produced eggs and egg products come from hens housed in genuinely higher-welfare enriched colony cages”, replied British Lion’s Ian Jones, in a piece published by Farmers Weekly.

EGG BOX LABELS

Meantime, in news related to the egg box labels upgrade call, improvements in country of origin labelling are being urged after glass fragments were recently found in frozen vegetables acquired from China, say Australian officials.

Bags of Black and Gold’s frozen broccoli with an 8 July 2014 use-by date are subject to a voluntary recall across the Eastern half of Australia, while Metcash – involved in these items’ distribution – has launched an investigation.

Now, AUSVEG representative William Churchill has sought to reassure the Australian public about the quality of locally-grown vegetables. “This example we’re seen is typical of the lax standards of produce that comes out of China”, he said in comments made to ABC News. “In Australia, we have one of the strongest quality assurance systems in the world and we want to make sure that people are confident in the Australian product.”