1.
GV Hen houses.
0.08

2.
NEARER V..birds in hen house.
0.12

3.
SCU House revolves, birds start to eat food.
0.17

4.
CU Birds eating.
0.21

5.
FULL CU..ditto.
0.24

6.
SV PAN UP..birds in hen house.
0.32

7.
SIDE V..eggs in wire trays alongside hen house.
0.35

8.
CU. Egg rolls on to wire tray.
0.39

9.
SV Farm-hand collects eggs.
0.43

10.
SV Walks away with baskets of eggs
0.46

11.
CU Seven baskets of eggs.
0.49

12.
ANGLE SHOT..birds in hen house.
0.53

13.
GV Hen houses.
1.00



Initials JRG/S/AHS/PB



Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved

Background: The price of eggs tumbles in Tokyo, Japan, to the delight of housewives and the reason is this revolving hen house.

Its big round cages contain up to a thousand birds each. Driven by an electric motor they move around so that the bird gate his equal share of the sun and a chance, at regular intervals, to peck at its food and water.

This system brings down egg prices to a recent new low 170 yen per kilogramme. The big aviaries enable farms to handle a large number of birds at the same overhead. This farm at Kamagaya, Chiba, has a row of six-ton cages each accommodating a thousand birds. It takes only eleven people to look after 10,075 hens. The cages can be turned by hand, though each is operated by a tiny 1/35-horsepower motor. The bird's droppings fall into a central container and sold as manure.

This farm believes that this merry-go-around poultry farming could have a psychological effect on the hens to lay more eggs...

The cost of a thousand-bird cage is 600,000 yen, or 600 pounds sterling. One of its advantages is especially pronounced in overpopulated, land-scarce Japan: the cages enable poultry farmers to keep a much larger number of birds on any given plot of land.