The "brother layer problem": Routine killing, biotechnology and the pursuit of ‘ethical sustainability’ in industrial poultry
Research output: Contribution to journal › Journal article › Research › peer-review
Standard
The "brother layer problem" : Routine killing, biotechnology and the pursuit of ‘ethical sustainability’ in industrial poultry. / Rutt, Rebecca Leigh; Jakobsen, Jostein.
In: Environment and Planning E: Nature and Space, Vol. 6, No. 3, 2023, p. 1785-1803.Research output: Contribution to journal › Journal article › Research › peer-review
Harvard
APA
Vancouver
Author
Bibtex
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
T1 - The "brother layer problem"
T2 - Routine killing, biotechnology and the pursuit of ‘ethical sustainability’ in industrial poultry
AU - Rutt, Rebecca Leigh
AU - Jakobsen, Jostein
PY - 2023
Y1 - 2023
N2 - The global poultry industry culls approximately seven billion day-old male layer chicks annually. Superfluous to both egg and meat, male ‘brother’ layers constitute a momentous problem, simultaneously economical and ethical, to the poultry industry. In this article, we scrutinize present and proposed alternatives to routine killing involving multiple biotechnological innovations, including novel methods for fetus sexing, genome editing technologies and re-sexing. We utilize a political ecological perspective that views attempts to solve the ‘brother layer problem’ as discursive and techno-scientific ‘fixes’ to problems of the capitalist poultry industry's own making and to rising demands for ethics and environmental-friendly animal agriculture. This context opens new avenues for profit-making by and for an expanding matrix of actors we view as an evolving ‘economy of repair’ that is built in part by public resources. Further, these fixes constitute an ostensible ‘ethical sustainability’ meant to signal both animal welfare and environmental improvements, which seem to work towards stabilizing agro-industry, thereby foreclosing alternatives to agro-industrial intensification.
AB - The global poultry industry culls approximately seven billion day-old male layer chicks annually. Superfluous to both egg and meat, male ‘brother’ layers constitute a momentous problem, simultaneously economical and ethical, to the poultry industry. In this article, we scrutinize present and proposed alternatives to routine killing involving multiple biotechnological innovations, including novel methods for fetus sexing, genome editing technologies and re-sexing. We utilize a political ecological perspective that views attempts to solve the ‘brother layer problem’ as discursive and techno-scientific ‘fixes’ to problems of the capitalist poultry industry's own making and to rising demands for ethics and environmental-friendly animal agriculture. This context opens new avenues for profit-making by and for an expanding matrix of actors we view as an evolving ‘economy of repair’ that is built in part by public resources. Further, these fixes constitute an ostensible ‘ethical sustainability’ meant to signal both animal welfare and environmental improvements, which seem to work towards stabilizing agro-industry, thereby foreclosing alternatives to agro-industrial intensification.
U2 - 10.1177/25148486221131195
DO - 10.1177/25148486221131195
M3 - Journal article
VL - 6
SP - 1785
EP - 1803
JO - Environment and Planning E: Nature and Space
JF - Environment and Planning E: Nature and Space
SN - 2514-8486
IS - 3
ER -
ID: 323546011