Norwegian chicken, Hong Kong | Norsk Kylling has an agreement with the world’s largest market

Frozen chicken wings from the 142 farmers in central Norway associated with the Reitan group’s Norsk Kylling are now exported to a large importer in China.

This is confirmed by the sales director at the factory in Orkanger. It is the company’s only customer in Asia.

Just before Christmas, Norsk Kylling received permission to send more than 12 tonnes of frozen chicken wings to the importer in Hong Kong.

“For the past two years, Norsk Kylling has had interest from a customer in Hong Kong, who wants to buy our chicken because of the quality and the standard we have for animal welfare,” confirms sales director Gisle Ranum in an email.

It is generally very rare that Norwegian chicken products are exported at all. It is not known what the agreement with the importer in Hong Kong is worth.

Shipped by ship

The product will be transported by ship to the Chinese trading metropolis. Spread over a total of 2,040 packages, 12,240 kilograms of chicken wings have spent three months on the journey.

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Once at the importer, the frozen goods will be further distributed. Norwegian Chicken states that they are not aware of who is the end user of the Norwegian chicken wings in Hong Kong.

In the Norwegian market, Norsk Kylling has carried out aggressive marketing, partly aimed at its competitors. Among other things, they have had several campaigns where their own animal welfare has been highlighted.

Animal welfare

The Norwegian company was the world’s first major producer of chicken to be ECC certified (European Chicken Commitment), an international standard prepared by animal welfare organizations such as Anima and Compassion in World Farming (CiWF), Norsk Kylling states on its website.

They also write that since 2022, all chicken in their value chain has been produced in accordance with the standard which, among other things, requires the use of more slow-growing types of chicken and gives them more space.

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The sales director also expresses that it is precisely animal welfare that has been the trigger for sales to potentially the world’s largest market:

“We feel that the demand for ECC-produced chicken is increasing, and think it is a great recognition that the market in Hong Kong has noticed the standard we have for quality and animal welfare,” writes Gisle Ranum to the Nation.