A CHICKEN processing plant looks set to win a four-year legal battle to keep its controversial extraction stack.

Although the parish council claims the chimney has brought "significant relief" from smells which emanated from the factory before, some residents in Okeford Fitzpaine claim the Faccenda Group's 25ft chimney in their village is an eyesore and spreads foul odours over a wider area.

One objector wrote: "The chimney does not solve the problem of odour. We regularly smell quite disgusting odours of what appears to be rotting animal matter."

Another claimed the chimney is "a scar to something of beauty."

The chimney was legitimately erected in 2002, but later had its planning permission quashed following a legal challenge.

The Department for Communities and Local Government later ruled the factory does not require an Environmental Impact Assessment sparking an unsuccessful legal challenge by objector Caroline Probyn.

And though the Environment Agency has ordered the company to further manage its noise and odour emissions, they granted it a permit.

Bosses at Faccenda say odours identified do not relate to chimney emissions. Council officers say such odours could stem from other operations such as the chicken farm.

A total of 130 people work in the factory, which processes up to 44,000 birds per day.

The site lies within a conservation area and is adjacent to the Dorset Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty and it is also a designated employment area.

Now planners at North Dorset District Council say the stack should be given permission to remain until 2009.

A report to go before councillors on Tuesday, July 4, concludes: "The stack has provided appreciable improvements to the odour problem."

And they claim provision for eradicating outstanding odours could be dealt with by a new permit or could turn out to be not attributable to the factory at all.

"The benefits derived from the provision of the stack, in relation to odour mitigation and therefore improvement to the amenity of residents, together with the desirability of securing this site in employment use, outweigh the disbenefits.

"The use of a temporary permission will enable the completion of a full assessment of the benefits that are being derived from the existing stack."