Lilian – the top poultry farming equipment suppler in China, produces quality battery cage system of poultry with reasonable prices. Lilian industry gives some explanation about the battery cage.
Battery cages are a housing system used for various animal production methods, but primarily for egg-laying hens. The name arises from the arrangement of rows and columns of identical cages connected together, sharing common divider walls, as in the cells of a battery. Although the term is usually applied to poultry farming, similar cage systems are used for other animals. Battery chicken cages have generated controversy among advocates for animal welfare, animal rights and industrial producers.
Battery cage is the wire cages for egg-laying hens, usually about 18 by 20 inches, with up to 11 birds inside. Each bird in a battery cage has an area smaller than a standard 8.5 x 11 inch sheet of paper. A single bird has a wingspan of 32 inches, and lives her entire life never being able to spread her wings. Cages are stacked in rows on top of each other, so that hundreds of thousands of birds can be housed in a single building. The wire floors are sloped so that the eggs roll out of the cages. The birds are denied their natural behaviors such as nesting and dustbathing. Because feeding and watering is sometimes automated, human oversight and contact are minimal. Birds fall out of cages, get stuck between cages, or get their heads or limbs stuck between the bars of their cages, and die because they cannot access food and water.
It was estimated that over 60% of the world’s eggs were produced in industrial systems, mostly using battery cage system of poultry. In the UK, statistics from the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) indicate that 50% of eggs produced in the UK throughout 2010 were from cages (45% from free-range, 5% from barns). However, introduction of the European Union Council Directive 1999/74/EC which banned conventional battery cage system in poultry in the EU from January 2012 for welfare reasons, means the number of eggs from battery cages for poultry in the EU states is rapidly decreasing. The EU ban was proposed when international scientists independently observed signs of distress in caged hens.