Chicken Farms
By The Mad Man

You'll have probably seen on the television over the last couple of weeks the storm that is being thrown up by celebrity chefs (Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall and Jamie Oliver) regarding the welfare of the chickens we eat.

If you don't know anything about it here is the short version: Millions upon millions of chickens are kept in appalling conditions each year - around 17 per square meter - so we can have offers such as 2 whole chickens for £5 in the supermarkets.

The chefs are bringing to the attention their awful conditions - living in and eating their own waste - and trying to turn the supermarkets and us public to free range chickens that have better conditions and actually see daylight during their lives too.

I suppose this is going to be a little different from my normal rants as I completely agree with the chefs that we shouldn't be keeping chickens in this state but I also value each and every pound that I have. So where does the balance sit? 2 chickens for a fiver sounds good or even a cooked chicken over the counter for about £3.50 really helps to make a cheap meal for those on a tight budget. OK the programs have put me off the idea of the cheaper chickens but again I cant see right now that I will stop buying them as a free range chicken can cost a heck of a lot more. But why do I always by free range eggs over normal eggs? Suppose the difference is in pence there and not in pounds.

Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall also encourages us to have our own chickens to use for eggs and meat. The down side to this is that it's not practical for everyone. Part of the regulations set on the street that I live on state that you can't keep chickens - or keep a caravan outside your house for that matter. I'd love to live his small holding life and have the cash to buy free range chickens or raise my own but that just won't happen as yet.

I'm happy that they are making an impact with their campaign. Sainsbury's sent out a letter to all of its customers informing them about their animal welfare. They also placed a full page advert in The Times on the 10/01/08 so like all the supermarkets they must be getting worried about the impact these programs are having on their sales. But unless the cost of free range chickens comes down slightly then I can see people carrying on with the 2 for a fiver instead of the £7 single bird that had been corn fed. I keep my fingers crossed that something will change and I would like to say a huge congratulations to Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall with the help of Jamie Oliver to bring this issue to peoples minds and make the supermarkets and farmers do something positive.