NFU responds to I News on poultry farm expansion

Dear editor,

Chicken is the nation’s favourite meat and produced to some of the highest animal welfare and environmental standards.  Your article (‘Inside UK’s chicken megafarm capital – where locals fear for their health’, 13 July) ignores the work by British poultry farmers to support sustainability by investing millions of pounds, voluntarily, into new technology and infrastructure that  prevents valuable nutrients  that are crucial to  producing food from contributing  negatively  to the environment.

Producers also rigorously adhere to stocking densities that are below the legal requirement and support both bird health and welfare. With the majority of chicken production now meeting additional requirements from retailers to lower stocking densities even further, we need an extra 20% floor space to simply maintain production levels.

That’s why we need a planning system which supports our farmers who are looking to meet growing demand, so that they can build resilient and profitable and businesses that provide everything the birds need while protecting the environment in which they operate.  

Frustratingly, this article makes no mention of the huge degree of difficulty the farming sector faces  with a very complicated and inconsistent planning system with endless delays, additional costs and applications that sometimes take years to get approved. We must have clear and consistent national guidance and an effective planning framework to give farmers the confidence to invest for the future.

As consumer demand continues to grow for affordable protein, urgent change is needed or we risk displacing  safe and traceable British  production with  chicken  produced overseas - countries where food is allowed to be produced in ways that are illegal here.

NFU Poultry Board Chair Will Raw