Morrisons

Since 2013 we have been working hard to reduce Campylobacter levels in fresh chicken. We have introduced a Campylobacter reduction plan which has shown significant improvements year on year.

Our results for the 2nd Quarter of 2021 (April to June) are as follows:

• 0.8% of our chickens have the higher levels of contamination compared to the FSA retail target of 7% from a sample of 120 chickens tested.

Our results now for the last 26 consecutive quarters have been below the 7% FSA retail target.

The facts:

• Campylobacter is a common bacteria which causes food poisoning which can be found on fresh chicken.
• Campylobacter is destroyed if chicken is cooked thoroughly.
• As a bacteria, campylobacter can be transferred on to any surface that raw chicken contacts.
• Food Standards Agency (FSA) advice is Do Not Wash raw chicken.

Click here for a quick guide from the FSA about Campylobacter

How you can prevent it:

We understand that campylobacter can be a concern when it comes to handling fresh chicken.

However there are 4 simple steps you can take at home to minimise the risk of food poisoning:

• Step 1 – Cover and chill raw poultry at the bottom of the fridge
• Step 2 – Do not wash poultry
• Step 3 – Wash hands and utensils after handling raw poultry
• Step 4 – Ensure poultry is thoroughly cooked

What Morrisons have achieved:

• A long term reduction of campylobacter levels from 2014 to 2021.
• We have worked with our suppliers and implemented a Campylobacter Action Plan, which has successfully reduced campylobacter levels on fresh chicken.
• We have established our own monitoring program; our test results show levels of campylobacter are now consistnently below the FSA 7% target (for the last 26 quarters).

What’s next?

While the results of our reduction programme are extremely encouraging, we are not complacent and we will continue to work closely with all areas of the industry to continually find areas to improve.

COOP

Food safety is an absolute priority for Co-op and we are determined to tackle Campylobacter. How will we do this? By working together with our farmers and suppliers to reduce the incidence of Campylobacter. We have been keen supporters of the initiatives the FSA (Food Standards Agency) have driven to combat Campylobacter.

Industry Campaign

Co-op were one of the first retailers to sign up to be part of the Foods Standards Agency’s ‘Acting on Campylobacter Together’ (ACT) campaign. The joint aim was to rapidly introduce and share the best workable and available technologies and techniques in food production and across the supply chain.

The FSA started the Campylobacter retail survey in 2014 sampling from nine retailers and publishing results showing % of chickens with incidence of Campylobacter at highest contamination levels (>1000cfu/g) . By the beginning of 2017 the overall results were showing a significant reduction in the percentage of chickens with high levels of Campylobacter from 20.3% (July 2014 – February 2015) to 7% with highest contamination levels (August – December 2016).

Heather Hancock, Chairman of the Food Standards Agency, said:

“The challenge we set of reducing the number of people who get ill from campylobacter has been achieved. In the absence of any other clear indicators, we can reasonably say that the work that we and the food industry have done from farm to fork has given us this really positive result for public health.

“This has been achieved by working with the industry to tackle this difficult problem and raising consumer awareness. We commend the efforts of the larger retailers and the major processing plants who supply them, all of which have shown significant improvement and many have achieved the target we set to reduce the highest levels of campylobacter. They have invested a lot of effort and money into interventions to tackle the problem.

Extract taken from the Campylobacter News Story 13.03.17

Our Results

From January 2017, food retailers have published our own Campylobacter test results for fresh chicken, in collaboration with the open data scheme on Campylobacter with the Food Standards Agency.