The latest figures show that on average, across the major retailers, 3.1% of chickens tested positive for the highest level of contamination. These are the chickens carrying more than 1,000 colony forming units per gram (cfu/g) of campylobacter.

Michael Wight, Director of Policy at the Food Standards Agency said:

‘It is encouraging that campylobacter levels in retail chicken are holding consistently low, however we will continue to work closely with retailers and smaller poultry businesses to bring levels down to as low as reasonably achievable.

‘We would like to thank the major retailers and poultry producers for continuing to work alongside the FSA in the publication of the results.’