British supermarket giant Tesco is set to put 1,800 jobs at risk across Britain amid a plan of scaling down bakeries in larger stores, the company has announced.

The changes will take place from May, said Tesco in a statement, noting that some stores would have "less scratch baking" and "simplified routines", and the company will "unfortunately need fewer colleagues to work in these areas."

"There are 1,816 bakery colleagues being put at risk of redundancy," it said, adding that customers were buying fewer traditional loaves of bread, with an increasing preference for other alternatives such as wraps, bagels and flatbreads.

"We need to adapt to changing customer demand and tastes for bakery products so that we continue to offer customers a market-leading bakery range in store," said Jason Tarry, chief executive of Tesco's British and Irish business.

"We know this will be very difficult for colleagues who are impacted, and our priority is to support them through this process," said Tarry, adding that "we hope that many will choose to stay with us in alternative roles."

Meanwhile, Tesco issued a separate statement saying that it has agreed to sell its 20 percent share in Gain Land to a subsidiary of its joint venture partner, China Resources Holdings (CRH).

As a Chinese joint venture with the CRH, Gain Land was established in 2014. The transaction will complete on Feb. 28, 2020, said the statement.

The move is part of Tesco's effort to "further simplify and focus the business on its core operations" following it's exits from the United States, Japan and South Korea.

As Britain's largest retailer, Tesco employs more than 300,000 people in Britain and has more than 3,400 stores nationwide.