"Misleading" Animal Rights Activists Cried Foul Over KFC Ad

After campaigners toured a farm recently highlighted in a film by a YouTube influencer, KFC has been accused of portraying poultry production in a "misleading" manner.

Controversial Video

YouTuber Niko Omilana visited a farm managed by meat business Moy Park, one of Europe's top poultry suppliers, which provides chicken to KFC, in the Behind the Bucket film released last December.

On the Joe news and entertainment website's Twitter account, the film has been seen over 1 million times.

What's Happening?

Birds are shown in a shed with fresh straw on the floor and perches for enrichment in the film.

Undercover investigators working for the vegan food company VFC visited the farm in February and reported finding terrible overcrowding, little new straw, and ill, lame, and dead birds.

The floor looks sodden with animal feces, and there is little or no fresh straw in footage released by VFC from inside the farm, which has a capacity of 380,000 birds. It also depicts ill, damaged, or lame birds and dead birds on the floor. The film was also taken of bins carrying dead chicken corpses.

Prof Andrew Knight of the University of Winchester's Centre for Animal Welfare stated the birds looked to be housed at "extremely high stocking density, within a big shed, with little to no environmental enrichment," after viewing VFC's film from the farm.

"Severe crowding and a barren habitat meant these birds had minimal room to roam and practice highly driven natural behaviors like feeding and exploring," he continued.

Odd Behavior

The birds in VFC's clip were displaying "behavioral indicators of stress such as feather plucking and topical skin infection," according to Paul Roger, a veterinarian and founder of the Animal Welfare Science, Ethics and Law Veterinary Association.

"This is the most deceptive marketing effort we have seen in a long time," VFC cofounder Matthew Glover stated. This picture of chicken farming is entirely false, and it is intended to convince the public that everything is OK when nothing could be farther from the reality."

"We take the welfare of the chickens in our supply chain extremely seriously," KFC said in response to the claims. We'll keep working with Moy Park to ensure these requirements are fulfilled. We'll keep pushing for openness, which is a vital element of our welfare work - dispelling myths and providing responsibility throughout the sector."

"Claims like this are regarded exceedingly seriously," a Moy Park representative told the Guardian. "We quickly investigated the film and independent audits and veterinary reports."

Assessment

"This farm is run to very high quality, and our first findings indicate that it is up to the task. The birds behave normally, and the farm complies with all stocking, enrichment, and welfare regulations."

Staff visits the sheds at least three times a day, according to the firm, to examine the health and wellbeing of the birds. "A small number of birds may die between inspections, and those that do are recognized and removed during the following inspection."

People in a shed at odd hours, according to the spokeswoman, might potentially disrupt the birds' movements.

"While we take these allegations extremely seriously and will communicate with KFC about these claims," Stuart Jones, head of Upload agency, which represents Niko Omilana, stated, "the footage that our client took part in properly portrayed the circumstances he observed and experienced on the day."

According to a spokeswoman for Joe Media, the recording it did for KFC documented the situations they observed and experienced on the day.

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