The Director of Animal Husbandry for the Government of Andhra Pradesh, the largest egg producing state in India, has directed the Joint Directors (Animal Husbandry) and District Officers to ensure that the state's egg producers comply with the Animal Welfare Board of India's order to immediately discontinue starvation force molting regimes.
In March, the Animal Welfare Board of India confirmed that starvation force molting is a punishable offence under India's Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act of 1960,and ordered all egg production facilities to immediately discontinue the practice.
"We are grateful to the Government of Andhra Pradesh and we certainly expect that egg laying farms will comply with this order," said N.G. Jayasimha, manager of HSI's factory farming campaign in India. "Egg producers who continue to starve birds to induce molt must be prosecuted under the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act."
Starvation force molting, widely practiced on egg production facilities throughout India, deprives egg-laying hens of food for up to 14 days and may be combined with one to two days of water deprivation, in order to manipulate their egg laying cycle.During a forced molt, hens suffer greatly and may lose up to 35 percent of their body weight. This practice of food withdrawal has been widely questioned throughout the world and is prohibited in Australia, the European Union, and the United States, under the American egg industry's animal husbandry program.
