Poultry
Poultry are a group of domesticated birds kept by humans for their eggs, their meat or their feathers. These birds are most typically members of the superorder Galloanserae, especially the order Galliformes (which includes chickens, quails, turkeys). The term also includes birds that are killed for their meat, such as the young pigeons (known as squabs) but does not include similar wild birds hunted for sport or food and known as game. The word “poultry” comes from the French word poule, which itself is derived from the Latin word pullus, which means game birds.
Poultry as food
Poultry is the second most widely eaten type of meat in the world, accounting for about 33% of total meat production all around the world compared to pork at 36%.
World production of duck meat was about 4.2 million tonnes in 2011. China was producing two thirds of that total which means around 1.7 billion birds.
Global egg production reached 76.7 million tonnes in 2018, a huge 24% growth since 2008.
Where this page comes from
The article above is adapted from “Poultry” on Simple English Wikipedia, by its contributors. We removed reference markers, navigation boxes and tables, expanded measurement templates into readable numbers, and kept the prose otherwise intact.
Both sources are published under CC BY-SA 4.0, so this page is published under the same licence. You may share and adapt it, including commercially, as long as you credit the original and keep the same licence.
Worksheets, answer keys and printable layouts elsewhere on K5Print are our own work and are not covered by this licence.