Efficient transport of poultry and poultry products is essential as poor transportation can lead to significant loss of quality and production and/or seriously harm the health and welfare of poultry.

Large-scale or medium-sized poultry producers are generally located close to processing plants or markets and contract or own means of transport for live birds. Birds that are slaughtered in abattoirs are often trucked live in crates.

Processed poultry carcasses, parts or products (including eggs) are usually shipped in refrigerated trucks. Recent developments in transportation, such as long-distance cold-chain shipments, have made it possible to trade and transport poultry and poultry products over long distances.

In many developing countries, however, bad roads and lack of marketing, refrigeration, and other infrastructure still hold back the spread of commercial poultry production. Poultry and eggs are often transported on bicycles, motorcycles, cars, horses, or even on foot. Eggs may be packaged in banana leaves or sawdust, and birds carried in baskets. Given such rudimentary transport conditions, poultry may reach market in bad shape, often with broken feathers and bruises.