Novel light spectrum technology is making the U.S. egg industry more humane by allowing producers to determine the sex of the egg before it hatches, thus preventing the killing of male chicks that don’t produce eggs.
Approximately 350 million male chicks each year are discarded into spinning blades that instantly kill in a process called maceration, The Associated Press reported on Thursday.
Now, the German-based Agri Advanced Technologies (AAT) has developed a solution to circumvent maceration, a practice that has been outlawed in some European countries and criticized by animal rights groups.
That solution is called “Cheggy,” a noninvasive “hyperspectral measurement” machine that “records light spectra and uses an algorithm to detect different plumage coloration” of the males and females….