Freedom Food or Free Range - what's the difference? Our guide gives you the facts behind the labels
We love our chicken. It's Britain's favourite meat, accounting for 40% of the market. Every year, British chicken farmers rear more than 860 million birds, making the UK the largest producer in Europe.
So why are we, the consumer, so clueless about the chicken industry? Ignorance is bliss. We take cheap chicken for granted. Logos and labels offer us some clues as to welfare standards, but few of us take notice or fully understand what they mean.
In fact, just 5% of British chickens are free-range or organic, and vast quantities of chicken meat are imported into Britain from countries with less strict welfare rules.
It’s time for us to wise up. Just a handful of companies dominate the chicken processing industry, producing the full range of chickens - from ‘standard’ to organic - responding to consumer demand. So our choices count. Next time you buy a chicken, read the label:
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Hugh wants everyone to make the switch to free-range chicken
