Barcodes - Country Of Origin

[Mr-H]

Today, my wife bought a chicken from Tesco. She was adamant that she did not want a 'foreign' chicken because she is concerned about animal welfare etc. Therefore we bought one which said on the label 'Class A British Chicken. We are proud of our strict welfare ....... for chicken'. Tonight, coincidentally, we received an email which states that British bar codes start with 50..... , that those which start 690-692 are Chinese, and that the chicken we bought (bar code starts 0252.... came to us from USA/Canada!! I am really trying to find out a few things - is this email correct; are Tesco's conning us into believing this chicken to have been UK reared; is there any place to confirm the country of origin of bar codes?

[Mamyalynne]

http://www.hoax-slayer.com/product-bar-codes.shtml

[Mass_Hysteria]

page down on the link

http://www.hoax-slayer.com/product-bar-codes.shtml

I would think Tesco(suppliers in UK) probably repackaged the chicken hence the UK barcode

[wolf63]

Here's another one http://www.snopes.com/politics/business/barcodes.asp

I thought that Tesco meat products usually gave the country of origin on the package.

[Buenchico]

There are various standards used for bar codes. '690', for example, means that a Chinese numbering system has been used, NOT that the product actually originates from China. The country of origin is not necessarily referred to in any bar code.

More here (which specifically rubbishes the email you've referred to):
http://www.hoax-slayer.com/product-bar-codes.shtml

[Buenchico]

I must learn to type faster!

[chas2008]

My wife worked on a chicken farm in the Cambs area that supplied chickens to Tesco, welfare isnt that good....25,000 birds per shed, fine when they are cute little chicks,not so good when fully grown . Permanently lit so they thinks its always day and continue to eat. Drugs given to them via the water supply...chick to table weight 5 weeks !!! rammed full of growth hormones to get the weight required.
If they go over their weight they only last so long as their legs cant cope with the excess weight, usually die of a heart attack...i know as my dippy wife felt sorry for them and kept bringing some of them home !!!

[annieigma]

Got to the point now where I don't trust any meat, there appears to be so many scams going on. It was the fish, river cobbler instead of cod, then red meat, horse instead of beef, and the living conditions of these poor animals is a disgrace, and unhealthy I would think. But, what do you eat? you've got to buy it from somewhere.

[tamborine]

As population expands so does intensive farming. Its demand & supply !

[Mr-H]

Just as a final update on this, I received this from Tesco in response to my original email:
"Thank you for your email asking about where the chicken you bought originated from. I can confirm after a colleague spoke to our business support team that the statement British chicken and the packaging having a Union Flag on it, means this chicken did come from a UK farm. I hope this helps and thank you for taking the time to ask us about this.
Kind regards
James Brownell
Tesco Customer Service"
There you have it.