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IKEA slammed for withdrawing animal welfare support

27-Nov-2017 - Last updated on 28-Nov-2017 at 08:56 GMT

IKEA has been criticised for withdrawing its support of higher animal welfare commitments

Related tags European union Europe Livestock

Swedish homeware giant IKEA has stopped sourcing higher-welfare broiler chickens in nine European countries, according to Compassion in World Farming (CiWF).

IKEA has withdrawn its support for CiWF’s Good Chicken Award, which recognises companies like Subway and Burger King for high-welfare practices in the food supply chain.

IKEA Belgium, IKEA Germany, IKEA Portugal, IKEA Czech Republic/Hungary/Slovakia, IKEA Denmark, IKEA Finland and IKEA France have all withdrawn from their awards. Only IKEA Italy and IKEA Switzerland will continue participation.

Dr Tracey Jones, director of food business at CiWF said: “IKEA’s lack of progress towards their higher-welfare commitments and their recent decision to withdraw completely from them, is not only disappointing, but a highly retrograde step and completely at odds with the growing movement for higher-welfare chicken production both in the EU and the US.”

IKEA is working on its own poultry welfare initiative, the ‘Better Chicken Programme’, which may suggest why the company decided to end its commitment to CiWF’s award in nine out of 11 European countries.

A disappointing move from IKEA. Their decision is completely at odds with the growing movement for higher welfare chicken in the EU and US. https://t.co/QVNEN94Ica
— Philip Lymbery (@philip_ciwf) November 24, 2017

However, the charity said IKEA’s programme was "likely to fall short of their commitments made under the Good Chicken Award”.

IKEA could not be reached to comment on this story at the time of writing.

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