Most UK supermarkets remain reluctant to sign up to the Better Chicken Commitment and “invest in the next step” of slower-growing breeds due to financial and supply concerns, Compassion in World Farming has admitted.
Speaking after the NGO published its latest European ChickenTrack report – which measures progress made by 107 BCC signatories – the campaign group’s global director of food business Dr Tracey Jones lamented slow progress on meeting the commitment’s criteria, with only two UK supermarkets having signed up to the pact and listed in the report.
Jones said that while UK retailers had played a pivotal role in “driving progress” on lowering chicken stocking densities over the past two years, most were “probably currently reluctant to invest in the next step (switching to slower-growing breeds) as this requires further cost and more shed capacity”.
“While they’ve already adopted many of the BCC criteria, as highlighted in our spotlight, breed change remains the main barrier,” Jones added, as she called on the UK supermarket sector to use its “influence and ambition” to help accelerate progress on breed transition away from so-called ‘Frankenchickens’ in the years ahead.
Her comments come just weeks after major hospitality brands, including KFC, Burger King and Nando’s, pulled out of the BCC and controversially launched the Sustainable Chicken Forum, citing the challenges around adopting slower-growing breeds.
M&S and Waitrose fly flag for UK
Waitrose and M&S continue to be the only major UK supermarkets to have fully signed up to the BCC, with the former praised in the ChickenTrack report for its “remarkable jump on breed transition”, which rose from 14% to 100% in a year, enabling it to reach 100% BCC compliance in 2025.
M&S also recorded the largest year-on-year improvement on stocking density, alongside Greggs, increasing from 31% to full compliance.
Compassion’s report also highlighted – despite their failure to sign up to the BCC – that eight of the UK’s major food retailers had now adopted a maximum stocking density (and BCC standard) of 30kg/m2 for their fresh chicken, including Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Aldi and Morrisons, with Asda to follow soon.
Both Sainsbury’s and Morrisons have also brought in enhanced enrichment for their birds, while Morrisons ensures that chickens are born in the barn in which they will be raised to avoid unnecessary handling and transport. Both Lidl and Tesco said they offered ranges that exceed the requirements of the BCC.
However, several retailers told The Grocer that further ramping up chicken welfare to fully align with the BCC posed key challenges regarding the scale and economies of production. One said that trialling higher-welfare options had also driven up food waste due to the higher price point discouraging shoppers.
Sources also told The Grocer the transition to slower-growing breeds had been frustrated due to insufficient space to house birds at lower stocking densities and questions concerning increased emissions from longer bird rearing periods.
“We recognise that sustainable food production is ensured through a combination of factors, including affordability, environmental impact and food security,” said a Lidl spokesperson. “By balancing these complex challenges alongside evolving customer expectations, we provide the industry with the confidence to invest in the future of British farming while delivering high-quality products that shoppers can trust and afford.”
Iceland declined to comment.
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Retailer concerns were echoed by British Poultry Council CEO Richard Griffiths, who said there was a need to “balance considerations” and that it was a “very difficult task in the current environment of rising production costs and uncertainty in many elements of our supply chains”.
He echoed supermarket concerns that current infrastructure did not have enough space for slower-growing breeds, explaining there would need to be 20%-30% more farm space to maintain current production levels and even more to facilitate growth.
He noted that a BCC chicken currently costs a consumer about 30% more and its environmental impact was “around one-third higher than standard birds”.
Based on February 2026 prices, Compassion said a BCC chicken from Waitrose cost £0.93 per kg more than a fast-growing chicken sold by Tesco (meeting all BCC criteria but breed), and only £0.63 per kg more than those sold by Sainsbury’s.
BCC ‘far short of viable’
“I think BCC falls far short of a viable system by being solely focused on one aspect of production,” Griffiths told The Grocer. “It’s important to remember that BCC product is available to those who want it, and every other aspect of BCC has already been adopted by industry.”
He added: “We are a country with good welfare standards that are applied well, and in that we have an excellent foundation for improving welfare over time and as the science progresses – we just cannot do that to the exclusion of everything else.”
However, Jones insisted Waitrose and M&S had showed higher welfare production was “both feasible and commercially successful” and asserted Waitrose had seen a 9% rise in chicken sales since adopting the BCC.
“Retailers in countries like France and the Netherlands are advancing,” Jones added. “The UK government’s Animal Welfare Strategy supports voluntary moves away from fast‑growing breeds, and countries like Norway have already committed to phasing them out. Without meaningful progress on breed change, the UK risks falling behind, despite claiming to have the highest welfare standards.”
Despite the slow action from UK supermarkets, the ChickenTrack report found that there had been “steady progress” in achieving its wider aims, with a reported 163 million chickens benefiting from on-farm welfare improvements.
Natural light provision, enrichment, and the use of controlled atmosphere stunning were the criteria where the most progress was made. However, the transition to slower-growing broiler chicken breeds and lower-stocking densities remained sticking points.
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