CHANGING shopping habits are forcing supermarkets such as Morrisons to reassess their property holdings, including writing down the value of stores.

A new report from property agent CBRE shows that supermarkets are sitting on more than 1,000 acres of land which they are not currently developing .

While the pipeline of new grocery stores in the UK is 46.61 million sq ft, only 2.8 million sq ft is being built.

This leaves 43.81 million sq ft of land lying empty – either subject to a proposal for a new food store, or with permission already granted.

Figures show store-building work has fallen by 20 per cent compared with a year ago. Britain’s four leading supermarkets - Tesco, Asda, Sainsbury’s and Bradford-based Morrisons - are battling tumbling sales amid a squeeze from discounters Aldi and Lidl.

Retailers have in the past faced accusations that they have been hoarding land which could find other uses such as housing.

But the slow-down in sales and the shift away from a “space race” of more, bigger stores presents them with a challenge about what to do with the building plans they already have in place.

In Bingley Sainsbury’s, which initially planned a supermarket on the site of the former Bradford & Bingley office in Main Street , which is being demolished, has opened a convenience store in the town. It said the B&B site would be made ready for development but there are no definite plans in place.

Sainsbury’s said recently that it was taking a £287 million hit to its profits after cancelling a number of new site plans, plus a £341 million writedown on existing stores which were showing little or no profit.

Morrisons wrote down the value of its properties by £700 million last March and also announced a paring back of future major store expansion. Instead, it is focusing on opening up to 200 smaller convenience stores.

Chris Keen, CBRE director of supermarket leasing, said “The rapid pre-recession market share growth achieved by the ‘big four’ was largely due to a huge wave of grocery stores released variously by the closure of Somerfield, Kwik Save, Safeway and Netto.

“The ‘big four’ also captured substantial trade from the Co-op.

“It was when these easy gains finally dried up five to six years ago that the big four embarked on a major development push designed to protect market share gains. It is that development push that has now ground to a halt.

“It is too early to say whether we are looking at a hiatus or the onset of an actual long-run decline in UK grocery store development activity. A sea-change in grocery markets is, however, certainly occurring.”