AS MANY people are probably now ruing the excesses they indulged in over the festive season, it's with perfect timing that Channel 4 launch their Big Food Fight series of programmes.

Kicking things off, local boy Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall is attempting to change the nation's view on the way we rear and consume our favourite meat, chicken.

Wanting to convey the conditions the average supermarket chicken goes through in its 39-day life span, Hugh, failing to get the co-operation of any intensive chicken farmers, has set up his own.

As the chap who has probably done most to raise public awareness of the importance of taking care of animals bred for slaughter, this has not been an easy thing for his conscience to cope with.

Tuesday's episode followed Hugh on his morning inspection of the chooks.

Operating under the same guidelines as any intensive chicken farm, any animal found injured or underweight has to be killed, as there's no profit in them.

Seeing one little bird struggling to move around was bad enough.

Watching Hugh wring its neck was worse.

When he returned to the shed and found another one in a similar situation, the poor bloke broke down.

In addition to the intensely farmed birds, he is also rearing some free-range chickens.

Given the same amount of floor space in the shed but with 1,000 less birds, these chickens are allowed what Hugh described as any farm animal's right: to feel the sun on its back and grass under its feet.

It will be interesting to see how he does in his task of converting his hometown of Axminster into the first free-range town in the country.

Unfortunately I don't fancy his chances much, given the brush off we've seen him get from the big supermarkets.

Even with the support of Sainsbury's poster boy Jamie Oliver, another keen chicken rights enthusiast, cash rules the roost for the supermarkets, and ultimately the consumer.

As one of the residents on an estate Hugh has charged the task of chicken husbandry to said: "On a fixed income with children to feed, you buy what you can afford."

While £2 may not sound like an awful lot more to pay for a free-range chicken, it'll almost buy another of the intensively farmed birds.

Whatever the outcome, I for one will remain converted.