HAZMAT and chicken-suit clad protesters returned to a Hereford supermarket at the weekend to rally support and accuse the chain of being "complicit in an act of ecocide".
Environmental groups returned today to Tesco, in Hereford's Bewell Street on March 11 for the third time in recent months, alleging that the chain is complicit in the killing of the River Wye ecosystem.
Protesters outside Tesco in Hereford's Bewell Street on Saturday, March 11. Picture: Marches Climate Action
Dressed in white hazmat suits, a group of ‘environmental investigators’ tasked with tracking down the culprits responsible for death of the river marked off an area near the Tesco entrance with crime scene tape, while others dressed as chickens deposited ‘hazardous material’ in the form of artificial chicken poo.
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Organised by Marches Climate Action, a division of Extinction Rebellion Marches, today’s protest followed previous ‘New Year’s Resolution’ and ‘Valentine’s’ events when the group say they collected 250 signed messages from concerned shoppers calling on the supermarket giant to stand by its own environmental policies and cease purchasing poultry from local processor Avara.
The protest on Saturday collected a further 150 signatures from shoppers old and young, a spokesperson for the group said.
Protesters outside Tesco in Hereford's Bewell Street on Saturday, March 11. Picture: Marches Climate Action
The group said that "reckless profiteering", partly by multinational Cargill, which created Avara as its subsidiary, and partly by Tesco whose poultry-purchasing contract "drives this murderous supply-chain” is helping to cause the impending ecological death of the river Wye.
Poultry manure is responsible for much of the phosphate pollution which has been a principal cause of the dramatic deterioration in the health of the Wye.
Protesters outside Tesco in Hereford's Bewell Street on Saturday, March 11. Picture: Marches Climate Action
For the past two years MCA have been investigating the Cargill-Avara-Tesco supply chain, the spokesperson said, initially focusing on Cargill’s importation of soya from Brazil where soya-farming has contributed significantly to massive deforestation. Subsequently attention turned also to destruction of the River Wye by the overstocking of the catchment with 20 million chickens, whose manure exceeds its carrying-capacity.
Protesters outside Tesco in Hereford's Bewell Street on Saturday, March 11. Picture: Marches Climate Action
As part of MCA’s campaign, the spokesperson said, more than 650 letters have been sent to Avara’s chief executive calling on the company to cease using Brazilian soya and to decrease poultry numbers, but with no response.
The campaigners have also said that a US court finding Cargill and others guilty of causing damage to the River Illinois "clearly indicates that both Cargill-Avara and Tesco had reason to know long ago what the effects would be of their intensified poultry operations in the Wye Catchment."
A Tesco spokesperson previously told the Hereford Times: “Protecting and maintaining water quality and biodiversity in our supply chains is an important priority within our supplier partnerships, and we’re committed to playing our part in ensuring the protection of the River Wye, alongside other actors across the food industry.
Protesters outside Tesco in Hereford's Bewell Street on Saturday, March 11. Picture: Marches Climate Action
“We continue to engage with suppliers and stakeholders across all agricultural sectors in the region as part of the Wye Agri-Food Partnership and have encouraged all of our suppliers to sign up to the Water Roadmap as part of the Courtauld Commitment 2030, which looks to reduce water pollution in key sourcing regions, including the Wye & Usk catchment.
“In partnership with WWF, we have funded some of the work of the Wye & Usk Foundation to tackle water pollution in the area. They work directly with a number of our suppliers on implementing nature-based solutions, including tree planting, as well as supporting farmers to test soils and implement on-farm best practice that all help reduce pollution in the River Wye.”
Avara, which is Hereford's biggest employer, has pledged action on the Wye.
Protesters outside Tesco in Hereford's Bewell Street on Saturday, March 11. Picture: Marches Climate Action
“We want to reduce the impact that our business creates,” the company’s agricultural director John Reed said on BBC Hereford & Worcester on February 7.
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“Supply chains are being monitored more and more closely,” he said. “We want to reduce our carbon footprint we want to reduce any suggestion of pollution or emissions where we can.”
The company has recently published a “roadmap” outlining the steps it has taken and plans to take to reduce the problem of chicken manure, which is used as fertiliser on nearby fields but is washed into watercourses, harming the wildlife they support.
It has pledged that by 2025, its supply chain will have ceased contributing to excess phosphate in the river Wye catchment.
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