Up to 80 chickens can be placed in colony cages. Photo: Supplied
Egg producers are misleading New Zealanders by not declaring that their colony laid eggs are laid by caged hens, says animal welfare group SAFE.
Although battery caged hens have been banned since 2022, colony cages - which are much larger but house dozens of hens - are still allowed.
SAFE has filed a complaint with the Commerce Commission, saying that the industry was failing to make it clear what colony-laid eggs were laid in cages, and this was a breach of the Fair Trading Act.
Head of campaigns Jessica Chambers told Checkpoint consumers have the right to make an informed choice.
"When the truth is too confronting to put on the label, then something is probably really wrong with the product being sold, and that is the case with colony eggs.
"We believe that hiding the origin of caged eggs behind misleading labels like colony is a breach of the Fair Trading Act."
Battery hen cages could hold about six hens, and were barren with nothing in them except wire.
But Chambers said colony cages were not much better.
"Colony cages can hold up to 80 hens and each bird is given a space about the size of an A4 piece of paper to live. They are highly intensive conditions, the hens never step outside and they only feel metal bars under their feet.
She said it was a "pretty simple ask" to put the word 'caged' on the eggs, as their polling showed found that more than 80 percent of New Zealanders did not know colony eggs came from caged hens, with half mistakenly thinking they were buying barn or free range eggs.
In a statement, the Commission said it has opened a compliance project in response to SAFE and will engage with the parties involved to get a better understanding of how the industry operated.
It said that will help to identify the best compliance or enforcement response, and pointed out that it received more than 18,000 enquiries a year and considered them alongside its enforcement priorities and available resourcing.
The Egg Producers Federation of New Zealand said in a statement that the poultry industry fully supported the removal of battery cages, and colony cages provided proven superior welfare to battery cages
"They protect the birds from external threats such as deadly avian influenza diseases and predators. As such, the mortality rate of colony-raised birds is lower than that of free-range birds."
It said as battery cages were phased out and colony cages were introduced, the industry introduced the label "colony eggs" and conducted a wide education campaign to make consumers aware.
"Colony eggs make up 30 percent of overall sales and consumers predominately do their shopping at supermarkets where colony eggs will no longer be available."
The federation said the only labelling complaints had been from SAFE.
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