Writer Heo Jeong-yoon x Jo Won-hee
Animal Welfare Picture Book

What is the secret of chicken that we haven't thought of?

Following the picture books “Borrow Me Dad” and “I Reached Out My Hand,” authors Heo Jeong-yoon and Jo Won-hee have reunited.
This time, I'm going to tell you a story about 'them', who are always present in our daily lives, very close to us.
A delicious egg on the table every morning, and a whole chicken enjoyed by the whole family.
Have you ever seriously considered "their lives" before they end up on our dinner tables? That cute little baby, born in yellow, is adopted the moment he's born.
He meets a diligent and attentive father, but he bathes in fake sawdust sand and only gets to see real sunlight for a very short time.
And my friends keep disappearing.
How did they live until the eggs hatched and became chickens?

Author Heo Jeong-yoon believes that animals also have the right to live happily, and has written several picture books on the topic of animal welfare.
After animals in captivity in zoos and puppies in breeding pens, this time it makes us think again about chickens in cages.
While writing this picture book, I looked at various materials and learned the following:


“Yellow chicks are born in the hatchery with a sweltering heat.
As soon as they are born, the female chicks move to the farm and the male chicks disappear somewhere.
Chicks missing one eye or with weak legs are abandoned every day.
Chickens love sand.
But on the farm, they make fake sand and spread it out.
The chicks wait for the exhaust fan to turn on for about 10 seconds, once every 20 to 30 seconds.
It gets a lot of sunlight in a very short period of time.
When white hair appears on the buttocks and shoulders, it is moved to a battery cage (a space the size of an A4 piece of paper).
In a space without sunlight or soil, artificial lighting is created and the animals are continuously fattened and laid eggs.
Four to six chickens are put in one cage, and they peck and bite each other to get food.
After one year, the laying hens are starved for two weeks.
If they starve, they lose all their fur and start laying eggs again.
Chickens lay eggs as if they were produced in a factory.
Chickens live in war every day for humans.”

The gaze of writer Heo Jeong-yoon, who always loves small, delicate, and weak things, captured the miserable life of a chicken.
The author feels that life in an artificial farm, where animals are treated as “objects” rather than “living beings” and are not given even the minimum amount of respect, is like a war.
The sharp gaze of artist Heo Jeong-yoon and the concise and powerful drawings of artist Jo Won-hee pose a weighty question to us.
'Can animals be raised in such a miserable way?'
This picture book will provide an opportunity to think deeply about the somewhat difficult and uncomfortable topic of 'animal welfare.'