Farmers Weekly’s campaign to stamp out food fraud

Abi Kay
Deputy editor, Farmers Weekly

About the campaign

A Farmers Weekly special investigation uncovered shocking food fraud and safety breaches at a major British meat processor.

Following the exposé, we launched the “Meat: Our Expectations” campaign to stamp out criminality in the meat sector.

The campaign was launched with four initial goals:

1. Reportable: Establish an independent, short-number whistleblowing line and make it a requirement for this to be clearly displayed in factories, alongside accompanying information in multiple languages
2. Independent: Ensure an independent body can verify how much British meat is going in and out of factories – known as the mass balance – so that dilution can be identified more easily
3. Swift: Address the 15min gap between auditors signing into a premises and entering the factory floor
4. Electronic: Make digital record-keeping mandatory

We have since convened a roundtable which brought together farming unions, food processors, retailers, consumer groups, crime experts and regulators to discuss the recommendations.

Two of our asks are already under active consideration by the Food Standards Agency, but we intend to refine and build upon them following the roundtable.

The final set of recommendations will be put together in a Charter for Change, which we intend to be signed by all the major players, before being presented to policy makers.