Tesco pledges to further reduce campylobacter levels with help of its suppliers
Tesco pledges to further reduce campylobacter levels with help of its suppliers
Tesco has pledged to further reduce the levels of campylobacter in its fresh chicken. Building on the progress made in recent years – working in partnership with its suppliers to tackle the industry-wide issue – the retailer has set a new target for levels of the bacteria.
Tesco’s Tim Smith: “We have agreed with our suppliers that by 2017 at least 95% of chickens supplied to Tesco will have minimal levels of campylobacter…”
From 2017, suppliers who provide poultry to Tesco will work with the retailer to meet a new specification which will see the numbers of chicken contaminated by campylobacter at the highest level fall to five per cent. This will be the first time a retailer has made its specification so challenging.
Although campylobacter is destroyed by thorough cooking, and all raw poultry sold by the retailer displays safe handling information on packaging, as well as cooking instructions to promote correct cooking procedures, the retailer wants to provide customers with the safest possible chicken.
The move comes after Tesco was found to be the only major supermarket to have consistently lower rates of chicken contaminated with the bacteria than the industry average, according to the Food Standards Agency (FSA) year-long retail survey of poultry to monitor campylobacter levels.
Tesco’s group quality director Tim Smith said: “Providing high quality, safe food is always our absolute priority. It has long been our commitment to reduce levels of campylobacter in our poultry and we are now seeing real progress at all stages of the supply chain, in tackling the issue through the work we have done with our suppliers.
“We want to remain at the forefront of any developments to improve the quality and safety of our chicken and believe that interventions, which are currently being trialled across the industry, will enable levels to be reduced even further. We have therefore agreed with our suppliers that by 2017 at least 95% of chickens supplied to Tesco will have minimal levels of campylobacter in line with the new limits that we are including in our specification.
“Whilst we acknowledge that there isn’t a single solution to address campylobacter, we are confident that we will deliver this target.”
Supplier reaction
A supplier to Tesco, Ursula Lavery, Moy Park’s technical director said: “Reducing campylobacter remains a top priority for Moy Park.
“We have been delivering industry leading work in this area and are totally committed to building on the successes we have already achieved in recent trials and through our supply chain interventions.”
