Poultry Industry

The poultry industry encompasses the raising, processing, distribution, marketing, regulation, trade, and consumption of chickens, turkeys, ducks, and geese for meat or eggs. Close to 75% of all poultry products are now produced under industrial systems of production, with close to half of that coming from only four countries: the United States, China, Brazil, and Mexico. This industrial system, [Page 1155]which moves billions of birds from farm to market, includes the large-scale production of corn and soy by industrial farms (for feed); billions of dollars of investment in hatcheries, feed mills, and poultry houses; a vast distribution network of roads, railways, trucks, and trains; massive processing plants that collectively employ hundreds of thousands of workers; and extremely large corporations that coordinate the entire process while ...