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| A Korean Animal Welfare Association member stages a performance in front of the McDonald's Korea headquarters in Seoul July 20 urging the company to switch to cage-free eggs as soon as possible. / Yonhap |
By Park Jae-hyuk
McDonald's Korea and Woowa Brothers have landed in trouble with "chicken rights" activists who protest the ill treatment of chickens.
Some of the activists call for an outright ban on poultry consumption in the name of animal rights.
Woowa Brothers, operator of the nation's leading food delivery app Baedal Minjok, had a problem with a group of vegans who made it onto the main stage of the company's annual event in Seoul, Sunday.
For the second year of the event, participants were quizzed on their knowledge about fried chicken. More than 500 people took a written test on chicken and underwent "blind chicken tastings," as sommeliers do blind wine tastings.
The intruders, who accused the event of ridiculing the death of chickens, chanted, "Chickens are also living things," raising signs that read, "You eat, I die -- Hen," and "I want to live -- Hen."
Woowa Brothers said they decided to report them to the police.
"We understand their thoughts on animal rights," its spokesman said. "However, their voices should have been made in compliance with the law. They have no right to disregard other people's opinions and emotions."
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| A group of vegans raise pickets at a fried chicken event hosted by Woowa Brothers at Lotte Hotel World in Seoul, Sunday. / Yonhap |
McDonald's Korea is another company that has collided with an animal rights group.
The Korean Animal Welfare Association held a press conference in front of the company's head office in Seoul, Friday, to urge it to introduce "cage-free eggs" to the Korean market as soon as possible.
Cage-free eggs are those laid by chickens that are not kept in cages. The chickens that lay eggs labeled "cage-free" are free to walk around the hen house, perch on roosts and lay eggs in nests.
"Among the OECD members, only Korea, Japan, Israel and Turkey are still using eggs laid by chickens in battery cages," an association spokeswoman said. "The method causes pesticide contamination of eggs, so Korea should adopt a cage-free policy as soon as possible."
McDonald's U.S. headquarters announced in 2015 it would introduce cage-free eggs to all of its restaurants around the world by 2025.
McDonald's Korea also said it has been preparing to switch to cage-free eggs.
"We are talking with an egg supplier over this issue," a McDonald's Korea official said. "According to the McDonald's global policy, we will switch to cage-free eggs by 2025."
The international fast food chain's Korean subsidiary emphasized it uses eco-friendly antibiotic-free eggs.
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