Noble Foods has launched an on-farm pilot project to explore how acoustic technology can be used to better understand, monitor, and improve the welfare of laying hens. This marks significant progress towards evidence-based animal welfare in the UK egg production industry.
The project was made possible by a successful funding application to Innovate UK (the UK’s national innovation agency), led by Emily Marshall, farm sustainability manager at Noble Foods. The funding supports a two-year research-based trial designed to test how the latest agricultural technology (agri-tech) can be applied practically, credibly, and at scale in commercial laying hen farm environments.
Developed in partnership with agricultural technology specialists AgriSound and Aviasenze, and conducted at an operating free-range hen farm in East Yorkshire, the project will test an acoustic welfare monitoring system designed specifically for laying hens. This is the first application of its kind in the UK egg production sector.
In addition to the free-range trial, Noble Foods is also testing the technology at one of its barn hen facilities. Evaluating the system in both housing environments will help determine how acoustic monitoring can be used to better understand poultry welfare under different conditions, while also providing valuable insights into flock behaviour, environmental influences, and welfare indicators. The aim is to ensure that the project’s findings are relevant to a range of egg production models in the UK.
This technology analyzes the soundscape inside poultry houses using machine learning to identify patterns in the vocalizations and activity of chicken flocks. These patterns can indicate changes in behavior, health, or environmental conditions. The aim is to provide farm teams with earlier, data-driven insights so they can proactively manage welfare, complementing conventional livestock husbandry practices.
This project seeks to explore how welfare monitoring can be further developed by providing continuous, non-invasive insights obtained directly from the birds themselves. By observing flock behavior in real time, the partners hope to better understand how changes in the environment, management, or health can be detected before problems become more serious.
Within the project team, the technology has been nicknamed the ‘Happy-o-Meter’ because it focuses on helping farmers better understand indicators of poultry welfare. Although this trial is grounded in science and rigorous evidence gathering, the informal name reflects the ambition to pay closer attention to chickens and learn what their behavior can reveal about their welfare.
Noble Foods emphasizes that this project is not a final solution or a single answer to welfare challenges, but a learning-based trial designed to generate evidence, test assumptions, and inform future thinking.
By working with technology partners, farmers, and Innovate UK, the company hopes the results of this project will help shape wider discussions about welfare monitoring, the adoption of agricultural technology (agri-tech), and transparency across the UK egg industry. The findings from the trial will be reviewed over a two-year period and shared with producers and industry stakeholders to help identify where acoustic monitoring can add value and where further development is needed.