The live transport of billions of chickens, turkeys and other poultry to slaughter each year causes significant suffering through thermal stress, crowding, trauma and deprivation of food and water during journeys.
Poultry live transport is a welfare problem of staggering scale affecting animals that are already compromised by the growth disorders common in modern fast-growing breeds. Catching causes acute injuries — wing and leg fractures, dislocations, hemorrhage — that are then compounded by hours of transport in crates exposed to temperature extremes. Winter transport causes hypothermia; summer transport causes heat stress and dehydration. Birds that die during transport have suffered unnecessarily when on-farm slaughter systems could eliminate transport entirely. Controlled atmosphere systems that stun birds at the farm before loading would dramatically reduce both the suffering of transport and the injuries associated with manual catching. The primary barrier to adoption is capital investment by slaughterhouse operators who resist on-farm processing.