Broiler chicken welfare at Sodexo
Sodexo has committed to the European Chicken Commitment (ECC) criteria across our European chicken sourcing and to the Better Chicken Commitment (BCC) in the United States. Each commitment applies to the geography for which it was made, and our US commitment does not extend automatically to Canada. We report progress criterion by criterion rather than as a single headline figure. In FY25 our European assessment covered approximately 91% of our raw and processed chicken volumes, and performance improved against every criterion measured in both FY24 and FY25. We have not yet reached full compliance across all ECC criteria, which is assessed cumulatively: breed and stocking density remain the furthest from target.*
Our commitments and standards
The BCC and its European counterpart, the ECC, set out a series of farming criteria, including breed, stocking density, lighting and enrichments, with compliance assessed cumulatively rather than criterion by criterion.
The European Chicken Commitment in Europe
The European Chicken Commitment sets requirements across breed, stocking density, lighting, enrichment including perch space and pecking substrates, housing systems and slaughter method. We use those criteria as our assessment framework in Europe and have engaged the majority of our European suppliers on our chicken procurement strategy on that basis.
In Europe, our progress has mainly concerned farming conditions, while compliance across all criteria is advancing more slowly. This transition requires the sector to build capacity: the study conducted by ADAS for AVEC estimates the additional cost of a full transition to ECC standards at around 37.5% per kilogram of meat, mainly due to lower stocking densities and the shift to slower-growing breeds. The ChickenTrack barometer published by Compassion in World Farming reports a similar trend among all European signatories, with breed transition remaining the sector’s main bottleneck.
We are continuing our work with our European suppliers and, as a founding member of the Global Coalition for Animal Welfare (GCAW), we collaborate with our peers to identify levers to collectively advance broiler chicken welfare.
Alongside that supplier work, we run a European category strategy intended to make the transition more viable at scale: aggregating volumes across markets, harmonising specifications so that suppliers are working to a consistent standard, and developing the supply base needed to meet the ECC criteria cumulatively rather than one at a time.
The Better Chicken Commitment in the United States
In the United States, our commitment is the Better Chicken Commitment, which sets comparable requirements on breed, stocking density, environmental enrichment and slaughter method. We contribute to the US Compassion in World Farming Broiler Chicken Working Group, which brings signatories together on implementation. The commitment applies to the United States; it does not extend automatically to Canada, where national standards apply.
National standards in Canada and France
Country standards sit alongside these commitments. In Canada, the standards that our partners in the chicken farming industry adhere to include no added hormones or steroids, a regulated production system, an annual independent third-party audit, and transition to controlled atmosphere stunning. In France, we are a partner in the Nature d’Eleveurs initiative led by LDC, under which covered products are 100% compliant with key European Chicken Commitment criteria including lighting, litter quality and the provision of perches.
Our progress
In FY25, we assessed our progress against the European Chicken Commitment criteria across approximately 91% of our raw and processed chicken volumes in Europe. The FY25 assessment included processed products, whereas FY24 did not, so the change in scope should be considered when interpreting year-on-year comparisons.
We report progress against each criterion individually. Compliance with an individual criterion is not the same as full ECC compliance, which is assessed cumulatively across all criteria and which we have not yet reached.
Performance by criterion:
- Compliance with EU animal welfare law: full compliance in FY25. This was not reported in FY24.
- No cages or multi-tier systems: close to full compliance, improved on FY24.
- Pecking substrates, perch space and minimum lighting: each improved on FY24 and each sits in the middle of the criteria set.
- Stocking density and ECC breed compliance: each improved on FY24 and both remain the furthest from target.
In France, 13.8% of our broiler chicken volumes are sourced from systems providing outdoor access, including Label Rouge, organic and certified free-range production, which are associated with lower stocking density and access to outdoor areas. Long-standing partnerships with four suppliers over more than 15 years have maintained continuity of supply through avian influenza outbreaks and periods of reduced availability, although mandatory confinement measures continue to limit access to outdoor systems.