Review of Hugh’s Chicken Run
Posted on January 13, 2008, by Conor O'Neill, under Food, Health, Reviews.
This is less of a review and more of a vote of support. Last week Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall kicked off a campaign to get people eating Free Range Chicken. He did this through a series of compelling programmes comparing intensively raised chicken production with Free Range.
Because no-one would let him film in a “normal” chicken production unit, he was forced to build his own. He split it down the middle with half as free range and half as intensive. Watching the differences become more and more apparent as the birds grew was a real eye-opener for me. Whilst we mainly buy free range, I had started to become dubious about the differences when I saw the same producer names on both types. But after watching this, I’m a total convert.
Quite simply, the methods used to intensively rear chicken are disgusting. If you want to eat meat that has been sitting in its own shit for its entire 39 day life, go right ahead but apart from any issues of animal welfare, if you want to see where Bird Flu will make the leap to humans in Europe, that’s where it’ll be.
Hugh’s campaign to get shops and restaurants in Axminster using free range were reasonably successful even in Tesco and the local kebab shop. His efforts with a local working-class community to rear their own birds, whilst laudable, teetered on the brink of condescending. However the emotional scenes during slaughter did drive home the reality of where your meat comes from.
I’d love to know how many people who eat frankenstein chicken also support a ban on fois gras. I know which one I have a much bigger problem with.
I did think the focus on whole birds was mis-directed. Most people only eat a full bird once a week. My feeling is that the bulk of chicken sold is skinless chicken breasts and ready-meals. This obsession with breast meat should be tackled too since it addresses the issue of cost head on. We have 1KG of free range drumsticks sitting in the fridge. They cost €4.99 and will give us a fabulous meal when we roast them up in the oven with some spicy coatings.
One thing that interests me hugely is the numbers angle for a company like Tesco. Looking at it as a simple punter, surely pushing higher margin products like free-range benefits the bottom line? Whilst in the 70’s and 80’s when everyone was broke, price wars on a loaf of bread could cause people to change supermarket, is that really the case nowadays? I find it bizarre that somewhere like Tesco Wilton will be jammed with “Value” chicken plus a few exorbitant organic ones whilst being out of stock of free range constantly. Increasing demand for free-range will increase supply and drive down cost and hopefully make the Frankenstein Chicken just a short term historical aberration.
I was a bit shocked to see the Tesco manger in Hugh’s programme using a green-screen VDU. I assumed all their real-time analytics would be in multiple large screen dashboards showing exactly what was happening where in the shop. Maybe that’s why Wilton rarely has free range?
There is surely a huge PR coup to be had by the first supermarket which goes 100% free range on chicken and eggs whilst using the “animal welfare and customer health” advertising angle?
If you can catch the repeats of this, please do. If not, at the very least sign up for the Chicken Out campaign and if you have a blog, add the badge to it like I have done.
7 Replies to "Review of Hugh’s Chicken Run"
david on January 13, 2008
Yes, the Tescos green VDU came as a really big shock. (laughs)
But I liked the program, although HFW grates a bit after a while. I prefer Jamie Oliver’s syle - as do the stakeholders, who engaged more willingly with him.
It is really in the hands of the consumer ……. if people buy more free range chicken and eggs, they will create more demand for these products, and less for the factory reared options.
It is as simple as that.
conor on January 13, 2008
Interesting David, I’ll review Jamie later but I found his program a bit sensationalist. Stakeholders engaged because Jamie has more clout!
It is that simple for eggs but I disagree on chicken. I’d say 60% of our attempts to buy free range in Irish supermarkets fail because the stock isn’t on the shelves. There is no record in any stock control system of a failed attempt to buy something. But we’ll keep trying and hopefully the message will get through somehow.
Note that many Irish butchers are now stocking Brazilian chicken. Call me racist but I don’t want to even think about that!
On the obesity issue Craig, my guess is that it’s due to the type of food that they are eating, not necessarily overeating. I did think HFW could have done a lot more to convince Hayley, particularly around the idea of using drumsticks and thighs.
david on January 13, 2008
Brazilian chicken makes absolutely no sense. As bad as Brazilian beef in Scotland, which the National Farmers Union is trying to ban I think.
And if shoppers can’t find Irish free range chicken on the shelves, it is up to them to let the shop manager know.
Both programs were a bit sensationalist, and as a viewer, you have to try and see past that.
As an aside, I really object to the ’summary so far’ bits that come in after each ad break. It is a growing trend, and is actually TV for morons. Clearly our minds have been so distracted by the shiny car, cheap insurance, or whatever ads are on that we cannot be trusted to remember the story so far. It is very insulting.
conor on January 13, 2008
Masterchef is by far the worst with the summary stuff. I think there is about 12 minutes of actual new footage in each episode!
Rebecca (living sustainably in Sallygardens) on January 14, 2008
Well said. We eat free range organic and we afford that by eating chicken less often, perhaps once every couple of months. Its now the treat it ought to be.
We tried raising the breed of white cob chickens that are used by the intensive farms … the bird has been bred so far from nature that even organic free ranging they still sat in their own crap and didn’t forage. They gain weight so quickly that their legs can’t hold their weight and as a consequence of their morbid obesity they often die of heart or liver failure. The bird has been bred to this extreme to minimise the number of days they take to reach slaughter weight. Just think, from chick to fat bird in little over a month … thats alarming, it ought to be several months if left to nature! They are a sorry breed. The whole thing is disgusting, driven by economics, the marketing hype the pulls the wool over punters eyes … just look at the idyllic farm images on the labels!
Congratulations Hugh, more exposes please, show joe public how it is so we can all react accordingly.
B. Darby on January 16, 2008
Having seen Hughs program Chicken Out i was apauled at the cruelty we humans have come to just to provide so called cheap food. this is no way to treat any animal , if dogs were kept in this way the rspca would be ther like a shot so were are they for theys poor animals. The weak reasons for not being able to afford free range birds is a sad reflection on people who say we cannot afford it there are no real poor people in this country and if we all changed to free range the prices would come down any way so come on all you supermarkets do somthing about this and stop making exscuses the same goes for all battery hens stop this cruelty now as for me i will only buy free range and organic products from now on
Craig Knott on January 13, 2008
I loved this programme, though I do have a soft spot for Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall at the best of times and have my own little chicken farm at home. I was genuinely surprised by the smear campaign and level of misinformation that appeared to spread across Axminster in such a short space of time.
I found it quite ironic that at various points throughout the series we witnessed people complaining that they simply didn’t have the money to spare for such ‘lavish’ purchases, yet they were sitting in a pub or often somewhat overweight. On the latter point my politically incorrect mother spouted that one particular larger single mother might more money to spare if she didn’t eat quite so much of the food herself.
I digress. It was disappointing to see just how negative the supermarkets were toward him: I very much agree with you that there is the potential for a lot of money to be made by the first supermarket to wake up and realise that Hugh isn’t trying to sully the name of the supermarket industry, but improve its ethical (or not) trading practices.
A good show.