Although Joanne is not able to respond to additional questions at this time, your concerns may have already been addressed in a previous column. Please check the Ask Joanne! Archive, which contains all the Q&As that have appeared here.

What is the vegan position on free-range eggs?

"Free-range" is not a legal industry term; therefore it is essentially meaningless. Farmers use the term to imply that they practice a more humane standard of production but, in reality, there is no regulation regarding how the word is interpreted or used. Although most consumers imagine free-range hens have access to the outdoors with plenty of sunlight, vegetation, and normal social interaction, to most egg producers, the "range" is simply a bigger cage than those in which battery-caged hens are kept.

Free-range egg farming is, above all else, a business. Consequently, profit surpasses concern for the animals' comfort, welfare, or behavioral needs. In addition, it is common for free-range layers to be debeaked just like battery-caged layers.

But even if free-range hens were treated with kindness and given all the space they could use, they will still be killed for meat when their egg production wanes, usually after one or two years, even though in a natural environment a hen could live fifteen years. And, like all other animals raised for food, they will be subjected to the horrors and abuses of transportation, handling, and slaughter.

An inherent problem with all egg production, whether free-range or battery-caged, is the disposal of unwanted male chicks at the hatchery. Because male chicks don't lay eggs and do not grow fast enough to be raised profitably for meat, they are deemed a financial liability, except for the few used as rooster studs. On average, one rooster is used to service ten hens. Hence, nine out of ten male chicks are considered virtually useless and will be killed by the cheapest means available, including suffocation and being ground up alive.

No matter what words or systems are used to candy coat animal production, when we treat sentient beings as commodities we invariably invite abuse. From a vegan perspective, the use of animals for human profit or gain, regardless of how they are raised or treated, is incompatible with vegan principles and the practice of compassionate living.