Chicken Farmers of Ontario warns farmers to exercise caution when handling chicken in extreme cold

Wednesday, January 14, 2015

by SUSAN MANN

This month’s recent cold snap has prompted Chicken Farmers of Ontario to post a website notice reminding farmers and others in the industry about best practices for chicken handling in extreme cold, snow and wind chill conditions.

Gwen Zellen, Chicken Farmers of Ontario vice president quality, service operations and risk management, says the organization posted the notice as part of its ongoing efforts to improve best practices.

“Working collaboratively with transports, processors and catchers, we developed this document to clearly articulate what stakeholders’ roles were,” she says.

Processors and transporters have also distributed the seven-page document to their members, she says.

The document outlines best practices not only for farmers but also for chicken catchers, transporters and processors.

“All stakeholders are expected to make all reasonable efforts to raise, catch, load, transport and process chickens humanely,” the document says. “Loading of birds should only occur if environmental conditions favour humane transport.”

The decision to cancel chicken loading could occur at any point during the process including as the birds are being loaded “if birds are deemed unfit for travel or environmental conditions do not favour humane transport.”

Chicken Farmers also has a similar document for extreme heat conditions that it posts when it’s very hot in the summer. BF