Arena Round Table – December 2023

in partnership with RSPCA Assured

15 January 2024

Participants

David Bowles

Head of Public Affairs & Campaigns, RSPCA

Deborah Hodson

Partnership Manager, RSPCA Assured

Diana Spellman

Managing Director, Partners in Purchasing

Emma Palmer

Senior Fresh Buyer, Elior

Joe Coombe

Senior Category Manager, Sodexo UK & Ireland

Kevin Dunford

Head of Food Purchasing, WSH

Mark Aylwin

Chairman, Unitas

Peter Statham

Head of Sustainability and Government Relations, Sysco GB

Pieter Lemmer

Global Director of Sustainability, Compass Group

Samantha Davis

Group Procurement & Supply Chain Director, CH&Co.

Event Review

Hot button issues up for discussion included the push for mandatory labelling to drive consumer awareness around higher welfare chicken, the effects of a shifting political landscape across four devolved nations, The ECC, BCC and a dawning reality that a 2026 deadline could come too soon for an industry still in post pandemic recovery mode.

2024 Elections and The Issues with Devolution

Put starkly by RSPCA Assured in their opening address to the room, animal welfare is a devolved issue with the four nations that make up the UK at patently differing stages of implementing or consulting on ‘mandatory method of production’ labelling as well as subsidies to help support farmers in providing higher welfare products.

In 2024, with a General Election for England expected in either summer or early autumn, the waters will remain muddied until a newly formed Government has the chance to establish itself. Yet that still offers operators, retailers, route to market and supply chain players the chance to work and engage with partners like RSPCA Assured to prepare for any forecasted changes before they might happen.

The BCC, ECC and Trying to do the Right Thing 

The Better Chicken Commitment (BCC) is a Europe wide set of standards for broiler chicken welfare which has gained public commitments from over 200 companies, many of which have bases in the UK. Retail giants Waitrose and Marks & Spencer have already committed to the BCC standards, yet there were question marks over why foodservice players had been slower to adopt. 

Some questioned whether there was still a job of education to do at farm level around the BCC standards, citing a potential lack of awareness with some farms who focus solely on catering and foodservice. “The market is tied up with retail and foodservice seem to get the scraps.”

Others struck a more optimistic tone, citing Marks & Spencer as having a potential influential ‘drag effect’ on the market – both retail and foodservice – that would eventually lead to more farms adopting the standards. “It took them [Marks and Spencer] 2-3 years to get their supply chain into gear to get the famers on board that could supply the product! Famers and producers will do what buyers and the market will tell them to do, producers will go where the market and money is – if you get that drag effect, which is what we predict will happen, a lot more farms will move over to BCC!”

It’s clear the issues surrounding higher welfare chicken are complex, and good intentions and actions from the companies sitting around the table can sometimes be stymied or diluted by factors beyond their control.

Some felt that in the face of meaningful change around higher welfare meat within their own organisations, that ‘naming and shaming’ of those yet to commit to the broader BCC standards from certain more ‘activist’ quarters could be viewed as a retrograde and unhelpful step.

Others felt hampered in their efforts to supply higher welfare products in public sector settings like school and hospitals, where food costs per pupil or patient are rigidly regulated, “it’s not something we as suppliers can absorb – it’s an issue for Government.”

Allied to the BCC, there is the ECC, or European Chicken Commitment, developed with animal welfare and animal rights organisations from across Europe to help reduce the suffering of the 8.3 billion chickens that are fattened and slaughtered in Europe every year.

One of the roundtable participants pointed out that while his organisation commits to all its fresh meat being sourced in the UK, getting the required volume of ECC standard poultry in the UK is challenging, “Very few UK producers in the catering sphere can meet the specific volume demands from foodservice operators, so it’s a real challenge trying to do the right thing – the volume’s not there.”

“We get to the point where we need poultry that meets ECC requirements that we have to source from Europe which then means we’re taking away from what we’re trying to achieve in terms of provenance.”

RSPCA Assured confirmed that the BCC standards could be met from importing to that standard but understands the friction this may cause if a company has a Buy British standard.

Timeline Anxiety

BCC policy states that those committed to its exacting standards should be able to meet them by 2026, yet the argument was put to the table that the pandemic, it’s long recovery, especially in farming and hospitality, and now the spectre of a 2024 English General Election mean that the deadline is effectively “around the corner”. Would it, offered one delegate, be better to ‘park’ mandatory labelling for the time being and have the Government create formal legislation around stocking density (the number of animals placed in a pen or other space compared to the calculated number of animals for the given environment) – a sliding scale that farms could commit to reducing over a given period?

Whatever the alternatives, there was clear consensus in the room that the BCC’s 2026 deadline is prohibitive at best. 

In Summary

It’s clear that the move to greater volumes of higher welfare chicken in foodservice is going to be a long, drawn-out process – one with many moving parts, but the sense of catharsis in the room was palpable, even if a satisfactory, finite conclusion could not be drawn. What’s clear is that every delegate in the room felt heard on key issues, giving RSPCA Assured the remit to take these shared challenges forward and try to find solutions by helping to influence suppliers and producers, while working to lobby Government at the highest levels.   

There is a clear need to help the foodservice sector with sourcing and understand the impact of the retail sector which RSPCA Assured will investigate.  RSPCA Assured will work with companies to understand the impact of the labelling proposals announced in England in January 2024 as this may solve the import of chicken to non-UK standards that was discussed and may also, as it could cover processed food, help the foodservice sector supplying schools.

Thank You

Thank you to Nick Clancy, Managing Partner - Foodservice, jellybean for this round table review.  jellybean is a multi-award winning, integrated, specialist food & drink agency that helps brands hit their sweet spot. With 35 years’ experience in hospitality and foodservice, they offer marketing, PR, social and digital services to some of the biggest names in the business. A long-time supporter of Arena, you can find out more about jellybean at www.jellybeancreative.co.uk

If you’re interested in hosting or participating in a future round table event, please contact Lorraine.

Event Sponsor

RSPCA Assured is the RSPCA’s farm assurance scheme and ethical food label dedicated to higher farm animal welfare. The use of the RSPCA Assured label makes it easy to recognise products from animals that have had a better life.  It raises consumer awareness,  builds confidence and trust in the provenance and traceability of the supply chain and supports the CSR aspirations of companies involved with the scheme.