Chickens are the most populous
bird on the planet.
There are 23 billion of them at any given time
That's 10 times more than any other bird.
It's an astonishing achievement for a bird
that originated as a small, wild,
jungle bird in South East Asia.
It's by far the fastest growing meat product
but pound for pound, the price of chicken has fallen sharply
How has this happened?
This farm is at the forefront of a technology revolution
that has drastically changed chicken farming.
It's run by David Speller,
who's pioneered the use of CCTV and CO2 monitors
in chicken sheds.
Along with his own farm, he works as a consultant
overseeing the raising of around
three million chickens in the UK.
You can't get away from the scale,
there are 45,000 birds in this barn
managed by one computer.
Two men will run 200,000 birds for me.
Chickens were first domesticated
over 8,000 years ago
but it wasn't until the 1940's that major efforts were
made to create a super breed.
The chicken-of-tomorrow competition in America
would change chickens forever.
The aim of that competition was to try and encourage
the development of a fast growing chicken that could provide
a larger amount of protein at an affordable cost.
The success of the contest rose
conclusively that it is possible to breed chickens with
superior meat-type characteristics.
Today, the life cycle of broilers,
chickens that are bred purely for their meat,
is entirely pre ordained.
They grow faster and bigger than ever before
and they can only live supported by human technology.
Modern industrialized farming requires the use of
artificial light, artificial temperature,
the whole life of these birds is effectively controlled
through technology.
Chickens have changed so quickly
they are now four times the size they were in the 1950's.
90,000 chicks at a time get delivered.
It's our job to nurture them and farm them up to a bird
that's then ready to go back to processing.
That starts around day 34, the biggest birds for us
off of this farm are around 39 days of age,
then we have a really frantic seven to 10 days
to clean everywhere, get it all nice and warm and fresh
ready for the next batch of chicks.
We do that seven and a half, eight times a year.
This efficiency is passed on to the consumer.
It's good value, I don't like referring to it as cheap,
these are not cheap, these are animals,
they have a worth, but it is great value, it's uniform,
it's healthy for you and consumers love it!
The reality of farming any animal for meat
is you take it to its optimal place
and then you take it to turn it to human consumption.
These birds, 38, 39 days is as far as we want to take them
for the product that we want to buy.
A barn yard chicken can live up to 10 years,
showing the huge evolution of change
the broilers have undergone.
But selective breeding on a global scale comes at a cost.
If the chickens live beyond their planned life,
they develop huge medical problems.
These birds can't then sustain that rapid weight growth
beyond the points of which they're normally slaughtered
because their bodies can't cope with it
and also puts huge amounts of pressure
on their internal organs as well.
And there are concerns the chicken industry
is relying on an increasingly small gene pool
Pretty chicks, yes Sir.
Alike as two peas in a pod.
If all of these chickens have the same genetics,
they're all fed the same food,
they're actually very vulnerable to diseases that come in
because they're all identical so if one bird is effected
all the birds will be effected.
Keeping chickens in battery cages
was banned in the EU in 2012.
But some people want to create better lives
for broiler chickens.
Free range birds have more access to open air runs,
while organic chickens are typically free from antibiotics,
hormones, and other synthetic chemicals.
Organic chickens get to live the longest.
81 days compared to intensively reared birds
which live between 35 and 40 days.
Free range chickens get the most access to open air runs
but when it comes to living space,
organic and free range fair far better
than intensively reared birds where as many as 17 adult
birds live in a single square meter.
Organic farming might offer animals a greater quality
of life but consumers are largely driven by cost
and in an average UK supermarket,
an intensively reared chicken costs several times less
than it's free range or organic cousins.
You are talking significant cost difference
and I think that's why we see the demand is not there.
If the demand was there we'd all be doing it.
Over 95% of broiler chickens are
intensively reared in the UK.
Organic and free range chickens make up the rest.
So what's key for me in being a farmer of chicken
is to understand what consumer wants to buy.
We are purely market driven.
For as long as shoppers want cheap
and plentiful chicken, they will continue to be bred
evermore intensively.