What's in a name - the role of education and rhetoric in improving laying hen welfare

Abstract

The rhetoric of laying hen welfare influences people's emotions. Terms like 'cage-free' and 'caged' connotes 'liberty' or 'imprisonment', or simply, 'good' or 'bad' for the hen. Science can determine the risk that the chicken egg industry (hereafter industry) practices pose to hen welfare, but a social license to operate will ultimately determine whether these practices are acceptable. Science and social licence do not always align and can lead to serious negative welfare consequences for hens. Furnished cages were designed as a compromise between the welfare implications of conventional cage and free-range systems, but societal concerns may still occur on the rhetoric that any cage is still a 'cage'.