February 26, 2008 - Uncaged eggs

 

Granville Magazine - Spring '08
and
Granville Online
by: Janet Gyenes

 

As part of the national Chicken Out! initiative, Vancouver city council resolved to support the sunnier side of the egg-laying industry when it passed a motion requiring all city-run food-serving facilities to use cage-free eggs. Now when you chow down on eggs Benny at Kits Beach’s Watermark restaurant or snarf omelette before teeing off at McCleery Golf Course, you can rest assured that the chickens that laid the eggs are as free to frolic as you are.

 

Chicken Out! was hatched by the Vancouver Humane Society to raise awareness about egg-laying “battery hens,” which are kept in small wire cages.

 

Vancouver is North America’s second city to commit to going cage-free, and it is dishing out a challenge to residents, restaurant and retailers: choose certified organic, free-range, or free-run eggs.

 

“It’s about making more humane decisions,” says Debra Probert, Vancouver Humane Society executive director. “And dropping eggs from caged hens from your shopping list is a really easy way to take action for animals.”

 

North America is well behind Europe, where a number of countries have already banned the use of battery cages. The European Union aims to be cage-free by 2012. What about B.C.? When Whistler resolved to go cage-free last September, it also encouraged its Union of B.C. Municipalities counterparts to get cracking and Chicken Out! To learn more about Chicken Out! visit www.chickenout.ca.