According to the Chicago
Tribune, the country’s largest chicken producers are being sued for
allegedly conspiring
to fix the price of chicken meat over the past decade.
Supermarket chains Bi-Lo and Winn-Dixie filed the lawsuit
against Tyson Foods, Perdue
Farms, and Illinois-based Koch Foods. Combined, these producers control about
90 percent of the $30 billion market.
According to the article, the retailers allege that the meat
companies have schemed to fix the price of chickens by “destroying their own
breeder hens and eggs to thwart production, resulting in a roughly 50 percent price
increase.
This isn’t just greedy and wasteful; it’s unspeakably cruel.
Innocent hens were forced to
live in filthy, miserable conditions only to be killed and discarded like garbage
just to pad the pockets of industry leaders.
But this is business as usual in factory farming. Last year an
umbrella group for the dairy industry was forced to give out $2 million in
rebates to consumers after being sued for killing
cows to fix prices. That’s right, the dairy industry increased profits by
prematurely slaughtering half a million cows and calves.
Factory farms don’t
care about the lives and welfare of animals; they care only about their bottom
line. As a result, cows, pigs, and chickens raised and killed for food are
subjected to nightmarish abuses: excruciating mutilations, violent deaths, and
nearly a lifetime of extreme confinement.
See for yourself.
You can fight the
factory farming industry by boycotting its products. In choosing to leave
animals off your plate, you take a strong stand against animal cruelty. Click here to get started. And check out our Pinterest page for
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