BBC Presenter Chris Packham Tries to Ban British Beef and Milk Adverts
BBC presenter and eco-campaigner Chris Packham wants to ban adverts promoting British beef and milk which were pulled from TV after he lodged a formal complaint with the advertising watchdog.
Packham complained to the Advertising Standards Authority that the adverts were misleading, amounted to “greenwashing,” and were “reckless” during a “climate crisis” as they promoted British beef and dairy as having significantly lower carbon footprints than global averages.
Backed by the law firm Leigh Day, Packham said “if we want to survive, we must reduce not increase our meat and dairy consumption.”
The adverts, run by the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board, encouraged consumers to buy British beef and dairy products. They aired between September 2024 and February 2025.
According to the AHDB, the ASA spent 14 months investigating Packham’s complaint, which initially covered four issues across a range of adverts, including national television campaigns.
Fourteen months!
AHDB now says that Let’s Eat Balanced campaign will continue.
Will Jackson, AHDB’s Director of Communications and Market Development, said: “We are proud to be able to highlight the role lean red meat and dairy can play in complementing plant-rich foods on behalf of levy payers, many of whom are farmers.”
In his spare time between presenting BBC’s SpringWatch, Packham does enjoy trying to ban things he doesn’t like.
Packham has tried to put restrictions on trail hunting, driven grouse shooting, snares, trophy imports, live-bird shooting, lead ammunition, animal-tourism shows, fireworks, cats, and artificial grass.
He has also sympathetically entertained trendy-cause du jours Just Stop Oil and Extinction Rebellion, and has questioned of whether his climate causes justify breaking the law.
Packham was once portrayed as St Francis of Assisi in a portrait commissioned by Radio Times to celebrate him as a “living saint” for his conservation work, particularly around Earth Day.
He also once said that “our politicians continue not only to ignore the evidence of climate breakdown, but accelerate our species collapse with this obsession over growth above all else.”
Luckily for Packham, because all these causes are fashionable left-wing shibboleths, none of it ever seems to trouble the BBC’s impartiality rules, those famously strict standards designed to protect public trust.