Firms will have to pass on extra costs of red tape, warns Fresh Produce Consortium.

The British Poultry Council’s chief executive has warned that an ongoing lack of reciprocity in UK-EU trade risks “normalising unfair trade with our largest and most important trading partner”.

New restrictions on administering drugs to healthy animals come into force across EU to tackle critical overuse, but UK fails to follow suit.

Export health certificates on food from the EU will now only be needed from July 1 next year - instead of October 1 under previous plans - after a crisis of lost lorry drivers and empty shelves.

The sector relies on labour from the EU that is no longer available, producer Paul Kelly of KellyBronze said.

Richard Griffiths, chief executive of the British Poultry Council, said the ban on so-called 'low skilled' workers has been a hammer blow to the supply chain - and therefore to chicken-lovers everywhere.