Selective breeding for production traits in poultry has created animals whose bodies are fundamentally incompatible with natural lifespan and normal function — a welfare crisis embedded at the genetic level.
Genetics is the deepest form of welfare intervention — it determines the capacity for suffering before an animal is born and shapes its experience across every moment of its life. The selective pressure applied to commercial poultry breeds has optimised for production metrics that create bodies incompatible with natural lifespan, normal locomotion, or comfortable existence. A broiler that cannot walk properly at 5 weeks is living in chronic pain as a direct consequence of genetic selection decisions made to maximise muscle yield per day of life. Reversing this through breed selection for welfare-compatible genetics is the most fundamental welfare intervention available for the poultry sector.