Article
Will PETA ever give up its campaign against the QSR industry?
The animal rights organization continues to press KFC and McDonald's to switch to what it claims is more humane processing for poultry.
May 10, 2010
KFC has caught plenty of flack for its Double Down sandwich, especially from critics exaggerating its high calorie and fat content. Animal rights organization People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals is playing right off that criticism to once again draw attention to its campaign against the company.
PETA's members are piloting a hearse around the country displaying the message "Double Down = Quadruple bypass. KFC kills: Chickens! And you?" For PETA, the perennial pebble in the quick-service industry's shoe, such controversial tactics are nothing new.
The organization's members have protested KFC dressed as chickens — or in nothing at all, with only a large protest sign held in front of them. Protestors have squirted blood on KFC customers and handed out buckets displaying bloody chicken legs to customers.
Its members also have protested other QSRs, most recently McDonald's. Last summer, the organizations made many parents angry when it passed out Unhappy Meals to children to teach them about how the company is cruel to chickens during processing.
The group is well aware that McDonald's and KFC don't process the chicken sold in their stores. But the companies have enough pull with their suppliers that if they asked them to switch to the method PETA advocates as more humane, their suppliers would do so.
"We're asking McDonald's and KFC both to adopt less cruel methods of chicken slaughter," PETA spokeswoman Ashley Gomez said.
Conflicting research
PETA advocates a processing method known as controlled-atmosphere killing (CAK), which uses carbon dioxide or a nitrogen/argon mixture to kill the birds before defeathering. The traditional method involves shackling the birds upside down by their feet and running them through an electrified water bath to render them unconscious prior to cutting their throats and defeathering.
The organization cites research that says CAK is more humane because it limits broken bones, eliminates excessive bruising and prevents live chickens from mistakenly entering the boiling water of the defeathering tank.
The National Chicken Council's Animal Welfare Guidelines forbid any such treatment. The guidelines state that the birds may not be caught by the wings or necks and that leg breakage is unacceptable. The goal is for less than 3 percent of the birds' wings to be broken or dislocated. It also claims the automatic knife is at least 98 percent effective.
McDonald's conducted its own independent research of controlled-atmosphere stunning (CAS) with the help of its two largest suppliers, Tyson Foods Inc. and Keystone Foods. That research, published last year, concluded that CAS is no more humane than the traditional method. Some researchers have even found that CAS may cause excessive distress to the birds, especially when done on a large scale outside of a controlled laboratory.
CAK, the method advocated by PETA, is a form of CAS. CAS typically renders the birds unconscious rather than brain dead.
High profile tactics
Rather than accept McDonald's research, PETA ramped up its McCruelty campaign with the Unhappy Meal efforts. Gonzalez said the group doesn't have any Unhappy Meal events scheduled but that members are welcome to distribute its remaining supply.
Gonzalez says the organization prefers to have constructive, amicable discussions with QSRs and poultry processors. The group also buys stock in the company and shares its agenda with shareholders at their annual meetings. As a last resort, the campaign tactics turn to full-page advertisements, protests and boycotts. Those in-your-face efforts are intended to catch the media's attention in order to garner, in essence, free advertising.
"We're dealing with corporate giants with huge advertising budgets," she said. "It takes something more provocative to get the story in to media outlets."
Gonzalez says the goal of its McCruelty and Kentucky Fried Cruelty campaigns have one goal: "to get them to make one specific change to their slaughter methods to prevent chickens from suffering (during processing)."
But PETA's real agenda may be up for debate, with posts on its website promoting a vegetarian lifestyle. Some blogs call for consumers to stop eating fast food altogether.
QSRs advocate animal welfare
As for KFC and McDonald's, they're done talking with PETA. KFC ended talks with PETA in 2002. KFC spokesman Rick Maynard said the company refuses to even comment on the organization or its efforts.
KFC is satisfied that its suppliers meet animal welfare standards, according to the company's website. Maynard also provided the following statement:
KFC is committed to the well-being and humane treatment of chickens. We're proud of our responsible, industry-leading animal welfare guidelines. We buy our quality chickens from the same trusted brands that consumers buy in local supermarkets. While we don't own any poultry facilities, we require all of our suppliers to follow welfare guidelines developed by us with leading experts on our Animal Welfare Advisory Council.
KFC says on its website that the company "continues to support and fund research into electrical stunning, CAS and other alternative methods of poultry stunning or slaughter." To that end, KFC and its parent company's Yum! Brands Foundation fund a graduate assistantship at Mississippi State University researching animal welfare.
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McDonald's, which did not return calls for comment, posts its animal welfare policies on its website. The company has developed its Animal Welfare Guiding Principles, which outlines its suppliers' commitment to safety, quality, animal treatment and other tenants.
PETA's message hasn't been completely ignored. Several QSRs, including Wendy's and CKE Restaurants' Carl's Jr. and Hardee's, have agreed to begin supplying from processors that use CAS once it is available on a wide scale and meets their quality control standards.
Burger King, once a target of PETA's Murder King campaign, has not signed such an agreement but says if any of its suppliers were to adopt CAS systems, "we would look upon them favorably in our purchasing decisions," company spokeswoman Denise Wilson said.
"Animal welfare is important to Burger King Corp.," she said in an e-mail. "By working with industry associations, suppliers, government regulators and BKC's Animal Welfare Advisory Council, our company strives to be an industry leader in animal welfare initiatives throughout the world."
While such agreements has held off PETA's protests in recent years, the organization may be planning once again raise a flap over those brands' supply chains.Gonzalez said PETA's next step is to ask QSRs like Wendy's/Arby's Group to follow through with their agreements and begin requiring their suppliers to switch to CAK.
PETA plans to present a shareholder resolution this month at Wendy's/Arby's Group annual meeting asking that the company honor its agreement by purchasing all of its turkey from suppliers that use CAK by the end of 2010 and to require its chicken suppliers to switch to CAK within five years.
No real change
Despite its high profile antics, industry experts expect PETA's efforts will not lead to any real change, given the high cost of switching to CAS systems. The poultry processing industry also is satisfied with McDonald's stamp of approval on the traditional electrical water bath stunning method.
Richard Lobb, director of communications for the National Chicken Council, said the poultry industry has not been swayed by PETA's efforts.
"First, you have to consider the messenger," Lobb said. "PETA is a hard-core animal rights group who just wants fast food to be out of business anyway. They're just trying to make it more expensive to eat chicken."
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