Tesco Beef Standards

Our Agriculture team have a dedicated Producer Club Manager who is responsible for the day to day communication with our beef farmers. As well as hosting quarterly Producer Club meetings we have recently launched the Tesco Sustainable Beef Project (TSBP) which aims to work closely with farmers in our supply chain to drive commercial benefits for beef producers. 12 farmers have been selected for the project which is based on 4 main Pillars; Meat quality, Environment, Housing and Farm veterinary health planning. We have teamed up with Westpoint veterinary group, Berrys and the Food Animal Initiative (FAI) to deliver on farm consultancy and implement Veterinary Health Plans which our meaningful, reduce disease cost of production and improve the overall health of our herds.

We have 3 types of beef available at Tesco:

Standard/ Value beef
Finest beef
Organic beef

Tesco Standard/Value

All our standard cattle are sourced direct from farm assured farms which are independently audited. These farmers are committed to the highest standards of quality, animal husbandry and animal welfare.

Our Standard and Value beef comes from both suckler and dairy herds where the cattle are mainly fed on a grass and cereal based diet.

Every piece of beef sold in our stores can be traced back to the group of farms where it was reared and the cattle are always purchased direct from farm and never through livestock markets.

Tesco Finest Beef

Our Finest beef is all produced from British suckler beef cattle. These cattle are specifically bred from both native and continental breeds to improve conformation and eating quality. They are traditionally born in the spring and reared in grass fields with their mothers, before being weaned. They are generally housed in winter, when the fields are too muddy and turned out for summer grazing. Summer grazing has been shown to improve beef tenderness and flavour. -

The beef is then matured for 28 days to improve flavour and tenderness.

Tesco Organic Beef

Our Organic beef comes from farms which are audited by one of the organic farm bodies, such as Soil Association or Organic Farmers and Growers. Organic beef farmers only feed organic cereals and manage their pasture land without using artificial fertilisers and pesticides. They also have strict veterinary health plans which minimise their requirements to use medicines or antibiotics.

For further detailed technical information on Tesco Beef standards please click here

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