Waitoa – Dedicated to higher welfare free-range farming

As a member of the SPCA Certified programme, Waitoa meets rigorous standards to encourage their birds to express natural behaviours and live an active life.

Once fully feathered, the birds have access to the outdoors, allowing them to roam freely across green pastures and forage under natural shade with shelter overhead. This commitment is supported by regular audits that prioritise the health and comfort of every flock.

By maintaining transparency from farm to plate, Waitoa continues to uphold the high standards of care required to carry the SPCA Certified blue badge.

How long have you been an SPCA Certified member?

Waitoa (Inghams) have been a member of the SPCA Certified programme since 2012.

What makes farming meat chickens special to you, and what do you enjoy most about it?

It’s great seeing our chickens out there ranging. They can go from an environment inside where they’ve got feed and water and all the home comforts, to being able to go outside as they choose. You can really see their characters come out, and its great watching them express their natural instincts. It’s great for us to see chickens being chickens!

Since becoming a part of SPCA Certified, what welfare changes have you implemented on farm that you are most proud of?

We’ve grown our commitment from a vision to reality, enabling the ability to foster the SPCA Certified programme into our everyday farming life, where our animals experience a high standard of providing the five freedoms of animal welfare.

The chickens in our care are given the opportunity for enriched interaction to encourage and maximise their natural behaviours on farm. Platforms and peck toys have been installed throughout our facilities, and free range farms provide the opportunity to venture outside to fossick and forage in large grassy range areas complete with abundant flora and shade to provide natural protection, in their living environment.

What message would you like to share with people about the importance of buying food products from farms with high welfare standards, like those who carry the SPCA Certified blue badge?

Customers purchasing products carrying the SPCA Certified blue badge can be assured the product they’re purchasing is grown in a high animal welfare environment aligning to the SPCA Certified standards. These standards are recorded, monitored and farming activities and conditions reviewed on a daily basis. The commitment from SPCA to ensure farming operations meet the SPCA Certified standard include multiple audits per year and several of these audits are random audits, to all our farming sites.