Post by Fredo on Jul 8, 2010 8:06:15 GMT -5
This year, like every year, has been a busy one for America's chickens. What the birds lack in smarts they make up in work ethic, laying about 78 billion eggs annually (or 6.5 billion dozen), supplying a $7 billion industry. GM should be doing so well.
Like any other workers, hens turn out economy products, premium products and luxury products - known as factory eggs, cage-free eggs and organic eggs - and consumers pay accordingly. A recent survey conducted in one random city - Athens, Ga. - found factory eggs going for $1.69 per dozen, cage-free for $2.99 to $3.59, and organic for $3.99 to a whopping $5.38.
But it's worth it to pay more because you're getting a healthier product, right? Wrong. Most of the time, according to a just-released study by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), the eggs are indistinguishable. When there is a difference, it's often the factory eggs that are safer.
The study, led by food technologist Deana Jones, was not designed to explore the question of which egg-laying conditions are best for the hens themselves - simply because there is no question. Factory hens are confined in what are known as battery cages, which leave them crowded and all but immobilized, reduced to little more than egg laying machines. Free-range and organic chickens have different degrees of freedom to move and are raised on varying levels of higher quality feed. There's no question what kind of life the birds prefer.
Like any other workers, hens turn out economy products, premium products and luxury products - known as factory eggs, cage-free eggs and organic eggs - and consumers pay accordingly. A recent survey conducted in one random city - Athens, Ga. - found factory eggs going for $1.69 per dozen, cage-free for $2.99 to $3.59, and organic for $3.99 to a whopping $5.38.
But it's worth it to pay more because you're getting a healthier product, right? Wrong. Most of the time, according to a just-released study by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), the eggs are indistinguishable. When there is a difference, it's often the factory eggs that are safer.
The study, led by food technologist Deana Jones, was not designed to explore the question of which egg-laying conditions are best for the hens themselves - simply because there is no question. Factory hens are confined in what are known as battery cages, which leave them crowded and all but immobilized, reduced to little more than egg laying machines. Free-range and organic chickens have different degrees of freedom to move and are raised on varying levels of higher quality feed. There's no question what kind of life the birds prefer.
link
I'll still buy mine organic and cage free. Even if they're right and the eggs aren't healthier, they taste better and the chickens didn't have the eggs tortured out of them.