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1.0 Background
Guidelines for Poultry farms were developed in the year 2015, which was applicable to
poultry farms handling above 1.0 lac birds. As per CPCB classification of industrial sectors,
‘Poultry, Hatchery and Piggery’ are categorized into ‘Green’.

In the matter of O.A. No. 681 of 2017, Hon’ble NGT, passed the following order on 16th
September, 2020:

'…'Accordingly we allow this application and direct CPCB to revisit the guidelines for
categorizing the poultry farms as Green category and exempting their regulation
under Air, Water & EP Act. CPCB may issue fresh appropriate orders within three
months and in if no further order is issued, all the State PCBs/PCCs will require
enforcement of consent mechanism under the above acts after 01.01.2021 for all
Poultry Farms above 5000 birds in the same manner as is being done for farms
having more than one lac birds. Till then, even without such consent mechanism,
the state PCBs/PCCs may strictly enforce the environmental norms and take
appropriate remedial action against the any violation of water, air and soil
standards statutorily laid down.”

To comply with the Hon’ble NGT, CPCB has constituted an Expert Committee comprising
members from Department of Animal Husbandry. ICAR-Directorate of Poultry Research,
Shri N.K. Verma, Ex. AD, CPCB, Haryana State Pollution Control Board, Tamil Nadu State
Pollution Control Board & Central Pollution Control Board.

2.0 Poultry farming

Poultry farms refers to breeding, hatcheries, layer and broiler farms. Poultry farming is the
rearing of domesticated birds such as chickens, turkeys, ducks, goose etc. for the purpose
of farming meat or eggs for food. Chickens raised for eggs are usually called laying hens
or layers while chickens raised for meat are often called broilers. Chicken are most
numerous and popular domesticated poultry species, while other species, e.g. duck, goose
form a very small proportion of activities in comparison. Poultry farming in India has
witnessed a spectacular growth and transformed itself into a vibrant agri- industry. The
leading states having poultry farms are Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, West
Bengal followed by Maharashtra, Karnataka, Assam, Haryana, Kerala and Odisha.

As per the 20thlivestock census carried out by Department of Animal Husbandry & Dairying,
Ministry of Fisheries, Animal Husbandry & Dairying, the state-wise number of poultries
(birds) are given below:

Sl.No. States/UTs Nos of Poultries

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3 Assam 46.712
4 Bihar State 16.525
5 Chhattisgarh 18.711
6 Goa State 0.349
7 Gujarat 21.773
8 Haryana State 46.24
9 Himachal Pradesh 1.341
10 Jammu & Kashmir 7.366
11 Jharkhand 24.832
12 Karnataka State 59.494
13 Kerala State 29.771
14 Madhya Pradesh 16.659
15 Maharashtra 74.297
16 Manipur 5.897
17 Meghalaya 5.379
18 Mizoram 2.047
19 Nagaland 2.838
20 Odisha 27.439
21 Punjab 17.649
22 Rajasthan 14.622
23 Sikkim State 0.580
24 Tamil Nadu 120.781
25 Telangana State 79.999
26 Tripura 4.168
27 Uttar Pradesh 12.515
28 Uttarakhand 5.018
29 West Bengal 77.322
30 Andaman & Nicobar Islands 1.289
31 Chandigarh 0.048
32 Dadra Nagar Haveli 0.089
33 Daman & Diu 0.018
34 Delhi 0.043
35 Lakshadweep 0.226
36 Pondicherry 0.236
Total 851.809

3.0 Poultry Farming Process

The poultry farming consist of the following unit operations.

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3.1 Breeder Farms(Breeding)

Breeder farms specialize in the production of fertilized eggs for either broiler or egg
production. Specific ratios of male/female breeders are used to ensure the fertility of
hatching eggs. In India both layer and broiler breeders are predominantly housed in cages
and the fertile eggs are obtained by artificial insemination. The eggs are collected daily,
assessed for quality and stored in plastic / pulp trays in a controlled environment before
being transferred to the hatchery for the production of commercial chicks. At the end of their
productive phase, breeders are removed and sold for meat processing or byproducts.

3.2 Hatchery farms (Hatching)

The eggs collected from Breeder farms are hatched at special hatcheries. These are
centralized facilities and receive fertilized eggs from its own or several other breeder farms.
The eggs are stored for a period of 4 to 10 days before being placed in incubators that
control temperature and humidity to stimulate embryonic development. Hatching typically
takes 21 days. The chicks are vaccinated, graded for uniform quality and dispatched to
destinations for further rearing. The day-old broiler chicks are delivered to broiler farms
straight run (un-sexed). Chicks from egg laying stock are gender sorted and the female
chicks alone are delivered for egg production while male chicks are killed and disposed-off.

3.3 Layer (Egg production)

In the layer farms, egg laying hens are reared for egg production. Typical egg laying cycle
starts around 18 weeks age of the bird and continues upto 72–75 weeks of age and
thereafter diminished gradually to become uneconomical. Birds less than six months of
age are termed as pullets and are raised either on floor or on the cages little away from
adult farms located in the same or at different premises. The birds are kept and raised in
three different houses based on its age i.e. a) Chick house: 0 to 45 days, b) Grower House:
45 days to 18 weeks and c) Layer House: 18 weeks to 72 to 75 weeks. The birds start
laying eggs from 18 weeks onwards.

There are two phases of growing period i.e. brooding and growing phase. The brooding
phase extends from day one to three to four weeks depending upon the season of rearing.
During this period, the birds are provided extra warmth in an enclosed quarter by means
of gas brooders, electric hovers, infra-red bulbs or coal brooders. After this initial period,
the birds are moved to growing establishments which are typically open houses. The
brooding and growing houses may be deep litter type or cage type. After the completion of
the growing phase, the birds are moved to laying cages where they remain there till the
end of their laying cycle (72 to 75 weeks of age).