Tesco has cemented its place as the most lucrative charity of the year partnership in the UK, smashing its £10m target for 2012 charity partner Cancer Research UK.

The supermarket chain has today announced that it raised £11.85m for Cancer Research UK, a significant leap from the £7.5m that it delivered for 2011 charity of the year partners Alzheimer’s Society and Alzheimer’s Scotland. Its 2010 partnership raised £7.2m.

Despite reporting the first drop in its annual profits in two decades - prompted largely by a disappointing performance in the US – Tesco’s year-on-year fundraising increase represents a more than 50 per cent rise in money to charity from the retailer.

Richard Taylor, director of fundraising at CRUK, said that Tesco’s suppliers, staff and customers had gone “above and beyond”. “The dedication they have put into raising vital funds to help improve the early diagnosis and detection of cancer particularly during a time of economic uncertainty has been truly inspiring,” he said.

One of the more significant fundraising events run during the year was a static bike ride, which raised more than £1m. Challenge events in the Sahara and Mount Everest also performed strongly, raising just shy of £200,000 for Cancer Research.

In recent charity partnerships Tesco has favoured health charities and in particular cancer organisations. Since 2000 Tesco has raised more than £30m for cancer charities.

The current charity partner, Diabetes UK, started its partnership with Tesco in March and has set a £10m fundraising target.