Growth Promoters Found in Chicken

Archived

Wednesday, 28 May 2003

The illegal use of antibiotic growth promoters in the chicken industry has received a huge amount of media coverage in both the papers, radio and TV.
The story follows work by Richard Young, the Soil Association's antibiotics adviser, and correspondence with Margaret Beckett. AGPs can be used in non-organic farming to increase the growth rate of birds, but cannot be given to birds to treat disease as they are not licensed as a veterinary medicine. The Guardian reports that one in five poultry companies are now using AGPs to treat disease, having previously said that they would no longer do so.

Source: www.soilassociation.org