It turns out that many consumers have been fooled, as a lot of those eggs were produced at factory farms. (Image : Kobizmedia / Korea Bizwire)
SEOUL, Oct. 2 (Korea Bizwire) – As consumer interest in eating healthy food is growing, eggs that are produced in a ‘natural’ way by free-range chickens instead of by chickens in chicken coops have been in high demand. However, it turns out that many consumers have been fooled, as a lot of those eggs were produced at factory farms.
Three nongovernmental organizations including the Korea Animal Rights Advocates (KARA), Green Party Korea and Lawyers in Advocacy of Animals announced at a press conference that they were planning to report Homeplus and CJ CheilJedang to the Fair Trade Commission for deceptive and exaggerated advertising. (Image : Yonhap)
Three nongovernmental organizations including the Korea Animal Rights Advocates (KARA), Green Party Korea and Lawyers in Advocacy of Animals announced at a press conference that they were planning to report Homeplus and CJ CheilJedang to the Fair Trade Commission for deceptive and exaggerated advertising.
The product that is raising the issue is Homeplus‘ ‘Green Life Fertile Eggs by Free-range Chickens’. On the package is a picture of chickens running around a green meadow, and a sentence that says ‘These eggs are safe, since they respect the life born by a hen and a rooster living in nature.’
CJ CheilJedang’s ‘The Safe Healthy Egg’ also has a picture of chickens in a meadow, with the logo ‘Delicious Naturalism, Freshian’.
Kim Hun-ji of KARA pointed out that the chickens were not actually free-range. “We visited the farm last week, and saw that the chickens producing eggs for the two brands were locked up in battery cages. They deceived consumers with false ads and sold them the product at a higher price.”
A battery cage is where you breed chickens in a structure built by stacking steel-barred cages, giving the chickens a space the size of two thirds of an A4 sized sheet of paper to move about in.
“By reporting the two brands to the FTC, we hope to stop companies from gaining illegal profits through deceptive and exaggerated advertising. Improvements should be made and the breeding environment should be marked on the package,” said lawyer Jang Seo-yeon, stating the purpose of the NGOs actions.
By Lina Jang (linajang@koreabizwire.com)
