Three months on from the Welfare of Laying hens directive, it has been reported that hundreds of thousands of hens in 12 EU member states are still being housed in illegal unenriched battery cages.

The European Commission has offered assurances that measures are in place to ensure illegal eggs are not leaving their country of production so as not to undercut compliant producers in other EU states, though concerns have been raised over the implications of widespread non-compliance for further animal welfare regulations, such as the partial ban on sow stalls which will come into effect from January 2013. Current evidence suggests that over half of the EU’s 27 member states will not meet the deadline for this new Directive either.

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Since 1st of January 2012 conventional battery cages for laying hens have been banned in all EU member states, however, Belgium, Bulgaria, Cyprus, France, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal and Spain all remain in breach of the new welfare laws. If these states do not achieve compliance by 26th of March 2012 the Commission has said it will step up action against them.

Member states had 12 years in which to begin work on meeting the cage ban. The same is true of the upcoming sow stall ban. The UK and Romania, which were not fully compliant in January both announced they had achieved compliance last month.

Food manufacturers in several countries have claimed the ban, which has resulted in eggs from illegal cage systems in non-compliant states being retained within their borders, has led to a shortage of eggs. They claim the ban on cross-border trade of illegal eggs has resulted in rocketing prices. However, farming groups have praised the commission’s decision to uphold the ban in the face of food industry pressure.

However, European farm union Copa-Cogeca warned earlier this week that there remains a risk to compliant producers margins from non-EU countries where producers do not have to comply with EU welfare standards. The union’s secretary general expressed fears that trade in non-EU eggs could rise substantially as a result of the impacts of the EU cross-border ban and called for EU officials to announce measures in response.

Pekka Pesonen insisted “It is ludricous that the EU has imposed a ban on its own producers, which has cost them over 5 billion euros, and not imports. Prices have risen as a result of this ban and producers have had to de-populate in the short term to give time to adjust to the new standards and costs or cease their production. Now the [food] industry is looking to boost imports, which do not have to meet the same standards, in order to fill the gap.  MEPs, EU Ministers and the Commission should protect the industry. The same standards which are applied in the EU must apply to imports.”

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