KFC’s Sthembile Shabangu writes that  “the (Daily Voice) readers deserve better than the inaccurate and defamatory article on KFC” and that “(they) are entitled to know that KFC SA is committed to the highest poultry welfare standards and our South African supplier meets all relevant national animal welfare legislation and industry standards.”

That sounds nice and all, but should we just take her word for it? What are the industry standards, and who’s in charge of ensuring that they are being met? Jou Ma se Purse gave KFC head office a call and Ms Shabangu has promised to answer these urgent questions of ours; questions that go beyond merely accepting KFC’s PR speak as the gospel truth. Jou Ma seriously doubts whether KFC’s corporate theory and letter writing matches its industry practice.

Jou Ma then called Stephen Heath, Corporate Affairs Director of Rainbow Chicken, who supply KFC. He had this to say: “Unfortunately you will not be permitted to visit any of our farms as we apply very security biosecurity controls – as I am sure you can appreciate we get numerous such requests from journalists and other parties and if we were to accede to all these requests we would be putting our birds at risk in terms of disease challenges.”

Stephen went on to tell me, a disease-ridden journalist, that Rainbow Chicken slaughter four million chickens a week! With so many dead chickens being supplied week in and week out, their company name should have more to do with the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. And of course, it’s us, the Rainbow Nation, that are so damn hoender honger in the first place. Raising animals for slaughter is one of life’s harsh realities, and as Stephen says “99% of the population don’t really want to know about it. They just want to eat and enjoy their chicken.”

PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) recently tried to take their global online campaign against KFC (www.kentuckyfriedcruelty.com) straight to the mense in the US, by buying TV airtime during the SuperBowl. However, FOX Network turned down PETA’s US$4.2 million offer. While Colonel Sanders and Rupert Murdoch (the media dictator that owns Fox Network) most probably fought in WW1 together – and so PETA will never get them to broadcast their message – the serious fact remains that there is lank min media space available for corporate criticism and healthy social debate.

If KFC has a bad track record in the US, Canada, and Australia for the way in which they treat their chickens before they are slaughtered, then we as South Africans have a right to know whether KFC in South Africa is any different. Rainbow Chickens’ Stephen Heath couldn’t even give Jou Ma the correct name of the independent auditing company that inspects their farms!

KFC’s Sthembile Shabangu was the moer in for the fact that I first approached KFC as a customer, and not as a journalist. I didn’t want to be force fed the same kak their chickens eat, which is what her letter of response basically amounts to. I’ll sprinkle some MSG on KFC’s letter and eat it, along with all of my words, if KFC or Rainbow Chicken go out of their way to help me as much as they claim to help their customers! I suspect the truth is something far less appetizing than what we are seeing on the menu.

KFC’s Sthembile claims that The Daily Voice have violated the South African Press Code for not having published the “information” in her letter before going to print. The Press Ombudsman, Joe Thlolole, couldn’t give me an opinion until such time as KFC actually lays a complaint. While he was as much help as a man dying of a heart attack being given a KFC drumstick, I took heart from the following sentence in the South African Press Code:

“The press has the right and indeed the duty to report and comment on all matters of legitimate public interest.”

Indeed, the duty. Jou Ma se Purse has pointed its finger and rolled up its sleeves. We are determined to ensure that the readers of The Daily Voice get an independent assessment of the conditions of South Africa’s broiler farms. Even if that means wading knee-deep through a warehouse of chickens in a biohazard suit. The truth will out.

To read KFC’s letter in full, as well as the original article published last week, please visit www.laughitoff.co.za

Dear Sir,

Your readers deserve better than the inaccurate and defamatory article on KFC that you published on 8 December 2008.

That was not journalism; it was a deliberately biased assault on KFC in which your readers were denied the facts because the criticisms were not put to KFC or our supplier, Rainbow Chickens.

Your readers are entitled to know that KFC SA is committed to the highest poultry welfare standards and our South African supplier meets all relevant national animal welfare legislation and industry standards. Our supplier is regularly audited in an independent audit which goes well beyond local legislative requirements and would preclude any treatment such as the allegations made in your article.

The poultry welfare requirements we have set are based on UK standards, chosen because we felt these were the strictest at the time of developing the programme locally.

Food safety systems at poultry suppliers are monitored to ensure compliance to all legal requirements and international standards. These, too, are independently audited according to stringent global standards which are reviewed on a regular basis and are driven by ever-changing technology, legislation, best practices and customer requirements.

The Farms, Feed and Fertilizers Act (Act 36 of 47) as well as Medicines Control Act (101 of 1965) governs poultry suppliers with regards to chicken feed formulations. All feeds are formulated by qualified nutritionists and are verified by responsible nutritionists and veterinarians. Only wholesome natural products are fed to the chickens.

Illegal substances are not allowed in feed formulations.  No hormones or steroids are registered for use in South Africa and it is illegal to use them in poultry production.

Feed is available to all chickens by means of pan feeders within a maximum radius of 4 meters placed at the correct height according to age of chickens. Force feeding is not practised at our supplier, beaks are not clipped and feathers are not removed from live birds.

Chickens are housed according to the weight and age of chicken to ensure acceptable floor space availability. Chicken houses are equipped with sophisticated ventilation systems to ensure the proper maintenance of high and low temperatures as well as fresh air flow to eliminate the accumulation of ammonia gasses inside houses. These parameters are monitored 3 times a day.

Chicken weights are strictly controlled according to growth profiles to ensure that overweight birds are not produced.

Your readers should also be informed that MSG is an approved food ingredient used widely in the local and international food industry.  MSG application in KFC products complies with local legislation and regulations.

The author of the article, Justin Nurse, was clearly intent on reproducing inaccurate information about KFC that has been circulated for years on the internet in a piece deliberately intended to damage KFC.

He did not approach KFC as a journalist, but as a customer asking a few seemingly innocent questions. He did not ask for KFC’s response to the internet allegations. Neither he nor the Daily Voice presented KFC with the formulated allegations to give KFC an opportunity to comment on them before publication.

All of this information could have been obtained, and should have been taken into account or published, according to the requirements of South African Press Code which you have flagrantly contravened in a malicious article under a damaging headline.

This appallingly one-sided and factually inaccurate article misleads your readers and makes a mockery of your claim to be “fighting for consumer rights”.

Yours sincerely,

Sthembile Shabangu

Corporate Affairs- KFC Southern Africa

KFC pumps lank monosodium glutumate (MSG) food additive into their food. MSG is like food tik: the more you have, the more you want, and it never leaves you satisfied. Marketed as a “flavour enhancer”, what MSG actually does is fool your tongue into thinking it’s about to taste food that is nutrititious.

Our taste buds are mos smart like this: in the same way that they have fat receptors that detect fat and others that can spot carbohydrates (as a way of telling what is actually edible food from, say, a piece of bog roll), when they check the MSG coming along in your mouth they think that it is free glutamic acid, which indicates protein in a food.

Your taste buds then tell your pancreas, next to your stomach, to start producing insulin – which is needed to break down the glucose in your stomach. The glucose is the blood sugar that is now in your tummy from the food that you have just digested. Glucose is like petrol for our bodies – it keeps the engine running.

So when you have a packet of dehydrated chicken noodle soup that has lots of MSG in it, your pancreas is in overdrive producing insulin as it thinks your stomach is busy processing lots of protein-rich kos. The blood sugar drops as a result of the insulin flood and this suppresses your appetite. So those little flakes in your chicken noodle soup may well be pieces of toilet paper with MSG sprinkled on it, because as smart as your body is, it can’t tell the difference between that and real food. All it can tell you, is that an hour later it is still hungry.

Sure enough, there are many culprits in the food industry that are milking MSG as an “anti-appetite” suppressant for all it is worth. KFC is just one of the guilty parties that would rather create the illusion of feeding you battery farmed chickens sprinkled with food tik rather than going to the expense of rearing free range chickens that are naturally high in protein, and thus actually good for us.

I phoned KFC’s Customer Careline to find out more about the conditions on the chicken farms here in SA. You know, how well do they live before they die? I was told that KFC buys all their chickens from Rainbow Chickens, that Rainbow Chickens have their own inspectors which inspect their farms, and that a manager would return my call immediately. I’m still waiting for the call, but in the mean time I have learnt a lot more about chickens, not to mention what happens to them before they become a tasty KFC burger.

Animal behaviourists tell us that chickens are smarter than cats and dogs. They understand cause-and effect relationships, say for example that an object still exists even when it is hidden from view, or that if they push a certain button they will get food. This even makes them smarter than small children. Chickens make over thirty different ‘cluck’ sounds as a way to comminucate with each other. In their natural surroundings they form social hierarchies, and each chicken will know its place in the ‘pecking order’ in a group of up to 100 birds. Each chicken is an individual, with its own personality.

Rainbow Chickens state on their website that they use “broiler farms” and that  “broilers are birds that are grown purely for meat production by providing them with an energy and protein rich, highly nutritious diet.” These are effectively battery farms where the chickens are kept in hokkies that doesn’t allow them to establish any kind of social hierarchy.

KFC is an international fast food brand that can’t simply buy in their chickens and claim ignorance as to the terrible conditions of the farms. If you are ready to think twice about eating KFC, go to www.kentuckyfriedcruelty.com and watch the Pamela Anderson video that details the atrocious conditions that these chickens endure. They are crammed by the tens of thousands into sheds that stink of ammonia, and their beaks get chopped off for easier force-feeding (the equivalent in human pain of having your finger chopped off). From being fed growth hormones which makes them top heavy, usually crippling them, through to how they are dropped into blistering hot water to remove their feathers while they are still conscious and able to feel the pain, the chickens suffer horrifically for two months until they are old enough to be killed by having their throats slit.

I love my meat just as much as the next man, but I’m beginning to think that unless I’m man enough to kill the animal myself, I’m not man enough to eat it. Colonel Sanders may look a lot like the devil, but I am no longer tempted. From the MSG soaked food to the way they run their business, KFC is an evil I can no longer stomach.