title: The happy hen on your supermarket shelf: what choice does industrial strength free-range represent for consumers?
abstract: This paper investigates what "free-range" eggs are available for sale in supermarkets in Australia, what "free-range" means on product labelling, and what alternative "free-range" offers to cage production. The paper concludes that most of the "free-range" eggs currently available in supermarkets do not address animal welfare, environmental sustainability, and public health concerns but, rather, seek to drive down consumer expectations of what these issues mean by balancing them against commercial interests. This suits both supermarkets and egg producers because it does not challenge dominant industrial-scale egg production and the profits associated with it. A serious approach to free-range would confront these arrangements, and this means it may be impossible to truthfully label many of the "free-range" eggs currently available in the dominant supermarkets as free-range.
authors.affiliation: Monash University, Faculty of Law, Monash University Law Chambers, 555 Lonsdale St, Melbourne, VIC 3000, Australia. christine.parker@monash.edu
authors.forename: Christine
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Parker
authors.forename: Carly
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Brunswick
authors.forename: Jane
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Kotey
mesh_terms: D000822:Animal Husbandry / Q000941:ethics / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence* / Q000592:standards; D000818:Animals; D001315:Australia; D002645:Chickens; D004531:Eggs; D019649:Food Industry / Q000941:ethics / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence* / Q000592:standards; D005515:Food Labeling / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence* / Q000592:standards; D006801:Humans