www.cbsnews.com - Chick-fil-A will allow some antibiotics in its chicken, ditching its "No Antibiotics Ever" standard - CBS, Mar 25, 2024

|------- In 2014, Chick-fil-A said it would shift to a "No Antibiotics Ever," or NAE standard, meaning the company would not use any antibiotics-raised chickens. But now it is switching to a "No Antibiotics Important To Human Medicine," or NAIHM standard. Under this label, antibiotics are used to treat animals if they are sick, but use of antibiotics that are important to human medicine and are commonly used to treat people is restricted.

The company blamed supply chain ... concerns about the company's ability to acquire antibiotic-free chicken.

Chick-fil-A promised to continue to only serve "real, white breast meat with no added fillers, artificial preservatives or steroids" and source chickens from farms that follow its Animal Wellbeing Standards, which includes US-hatched and raised animals that are provided nutritional food and live in temperature controlled barns. -------|
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asmith.ucdavis.edu - Egg Prices are Still High, Especially in California - March 15, 2023

|------- That is what happens when a product most people buy quintuples in price.

The proximate cause of the price spike was avian flu, which caused millions of chickens to be killed, thereby reducing the supply of eggs. In the background, however, a massive transition is underway as the egg industry moves from caged to cage-free operation. What role did this play in the egg price spike?

Prior to 2015, California prices averaged about 60c per dozen higher than the Midwest, likely because most California eggs are produced in the Midwest and need to be shipped from there to here.

This requirement stemmed from Proposition 2, which California voters passed in 2008. Under the PFACA, California prices have been 85c above Midwest prices. It seems clear the PFACA raised the cost of producing eggs for California. ... In 2022 after Proposition 12 took effect, California wholesale egg prices averaged $1 higher than Midwest, up from a 85c gap in 2015-2021. ... Cage-free egg production is more expensive because hens that move more eat more and because disease spreads more easily. The price spread was more volatile in 2022 than before, perhaps indicating that the cage-free market is thin, i.e., more easily disrupted. ...

Proposition 12 also applies to hogs (which I wrote about here), but litigation has held up its implementation for pork products.
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Check out the charts in the document.
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