Members of the BPC Antibiotic Stewardship have reduced total antibiotic use by more than 86% since 2012, as the BPC publishes its tenth consecutive Antibiotic Stewardship Report. View the full 2026 BPC Antibiotic Stewardship Report below.

The British Poultry Council has today published its 2026 Antibiotic Stewardship Report, covering 2025 usage data and marking ten years since the sector first began publishing this data in 2016, the first livestock sector to do so – paving the way for other sectors to follow. The report confirms that total antibiotic use has fallen to its lowest level in the scheme’s history, at 11.15 tonnes in 2025, down from 13.70 tonnes in 2024.

This represents an 86.4% reduction in total antibiotic use since the 2012 baseline of 81.67 tonnes, and a 96.8% reduction in the use of Critically Important Antibiotics (CIAs) – those most vital to human medicine – over the same period. Polymyxins, a class of last-resort antibiotic, have not been used in UK poultry meat production for  nine consecutive years.

The sector has also recorded zero prophylactic antibiotic use for the tenth consecutive year, following a voluntary commitment made by the industry in 2016 to end preventative use entirely.

All species remain within or below the RUMA species-specific targets:

• Chickens: 9.12 mg/pcu, against a target of 25 mg/pcu – the lowest level ever
• Turkeys: 36.72 mg/pcu, against a target of 50 mg/pcu
• Ducks: 0.82 mg/pcu, with no formal RUMA target but tracked and published voluntarily

2025 also marks the sector’s transition to mg/kg as its primary reporting metric, aligning with EU methodology and enabling international benchmarking of British poultry meat performance for the first time.

Dr Kitty Healey, Head of Surveillance Division at the Veterinary Medicines, said:

“Congratulations to the British Poultry Council and its members on achieving their lowest recorded overall antibiotic use to date. An 82% reduction in use since 2014 is a remarkable achievement – which has been accompanied over a similar period by marked reductions in antimicrobial resistance in the indicator bacteria E. coli from healthy broilers and turkeys. The British Poultry Council were the early adopters of action on AMR, establishing the BPC Antibiotic Stewardship programme in 2011. These results underline the long term beneficial impact of stewardship actions taken by poultry farmers, vets and industry partners in reducing not just antibiotic use, but crucially, antibiotic resistance.”

Máire Burnett, Technical Director at the British Poultry Council, said:

“An 86% reduction in use since 2012 , and a 97% reduction in the antibiotics that matter most to human health, is the result of all the hard work of farmers and vets who have a duty of care to their animals. This is not a race to zero – we want the ability to treat sick birds without compromising their health and welfare whilst safeguarding the efficacy of antibiotics. Consumers and retailers can be confident that British poultry meat is produced responsibly, and this report is the evidence.”

Muhammed Maliki, Chair of the BPC Antibiotic Stewardship, said:

“This report reflects a decade of sector-wide collaboration and reporting and a shared focus on responsible antibiotic use, and sharing our data pre-competitively so we can all learn from each other. The priorities now are biosecurity, vaccine access and continuing to build the evidence base that lets vets and farmers make the right call for animal health and welfare.”

Looking ahead

Looking ahead, the BPC says the Stewardship’s priorities include improved access to vaccines, deepening on-farm biosecurity, embedding mg/kg as the standard reporting metric, and strengthening the UK’s contribution to global antimicrobial resistance (AMR) monitoring through the International Poultry Council and the UN’s global monitoring framework.

The data covers antibiotic use across the membership of the BPC Antibiotic Stewardship, which accounts for approximately 85% of UK poultry meat production, gathered through the BPC’s pre-competitive data-sharing framework and verified against species production volumes. The data is also reported in the government’s Veterinary Antimicrobial Resistance and Sales Report on an annual basis.

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Download the 2026 Antibiotics Report here or view it below. Please note, it may take a little time for the viewer to load the full PDF, due to the file size and number of pages.

ENDS

Notes to editors

About the British Poultry Council

The British Poultry Council is the representative body for poultry meat producers in the UK, covering chicken, turkey, duck and goose production. BPC member companies span the full length of the supply chain – from breeding and hatching through to processing and packing – and together account for around 80% of British poultry meat output. Annual antibiotic stewardship reporting has been a cornerstone of BPC membership since 2016.

Key figures at a glance

• Total antibiotic use 2025: 11.15 tonnes (down from 13.70 tonnes in 2024)
• Reduction since 2012 baseline: 86.4% (total use); 96.8% (Critically Important Antibiotics)
• CIA use 2025: 0.088 tonnes total (fluoroquinolones 0.001 tonnes, macrolides 0.087 tonnes, polymyxins 0 tonnes)
• Prophylactic antibiotic use: zero, for the tenth consecutive year
• Antibiotic use by class 2025: amoxicillin 66.33%, tetracyclines 16.97%

Media contact: Jane Saward | jsaward@britishpoultry.org.uk | M: 07552 529019