Food security in the UK

• Farming Evidence Pack (DEFRA)
  A key topic in the conservative's 2024 manifesto
• UK governmental food security review, 2021

The food security debate in the UK is very different from LMICS. Not about The FAO's criteria

In European policy, the large agro-business corporations have co-opted the word 'food security' to their own ends.

Food security concerns for the UK

• Food prices
  • The UK consistently ranks as one of the most food insecure parts of Europe with 7.2 million people living in food insecure households in 2024.
  • Affordability in 2022 was best in Europe according OWID citing usda data on % of income spent on food.
• supply chain fragility triggered by Ukraine and COVID19
  • food prices go up
  • "emptying our shelves"
• #farmers leaving the profession
  • They believe its:
  • Red tape preventing exports
  • Red tape in the planning system preventing building glasshouses, grain stores etc
  • Rising costs
  • lack of subisidies
• reliance on seasonal labour
  • Reduces stability of our food chain.
  • A survey from Arla of it's owner farmers argues that as many as 86% of dairy farmers get little to no applicants with the right skills for their job ads.

A key determinant of UK food sec is natural gas prices which determine things like fertiliser.

• A healthy diet is unaffordable in the UK without meat reduction

• Harwatt and Hayek, 2019 argue that the UK could rewild to forest all the land it uses for grazing and all the land it uses to grow food for animal feed and it would still have enough calories and protein to feed everyone

• Check this: The Landworkers’ Alliance, Pasture for Life, Sustain and Hodmedod (2023)

The combined land area for rearing beef and lamb for UK consumption is larger than the UK itself. Source: National Food Strategy.

Imports don't always reduce food security as they represent diversification of food sources.

pro animal food security arguments

• Environmental damage from CAFOs is a medium-long term food sec threat
  • UK winters have become 1C warmer and 15% wetter in the past century.
  • human-caused climate change had made the UK’s record-breaking heatwave at least 10 times more likely.
• Big meat producers and supermarkets are squeezing farmers and that's causing the farming crisis
• Animal disease outbreaks threaten food security
• We import XX% of our feed crops from Europe
• medium term alt proteins from British crops might be a good way to ensure food sovereignty
• Long term British cultivated meat might work
• Farmers believe climate change affects their yields, highlight climate change impact from meat

The consolidation and intensification of farms means the food system is increasingly in the hands of just a few powerful companies.

WWF, 2022 models whether the UK could be fed on a Livestock on leftovers will not save us, we have to reduce meat approach that is very low animal.

Self sufficiency

The UK already has a relatively high degree of self-sufficiency, producing over 100% of the barley we consume, 90% of wheat, 80% of oilseeds, 70% of potatoes. By volume we also produce roughly the same amount of meat, milk and eggs as we consume. However, UK self-sufficiency in fruits and vegetables falls short, with only 53% of vegetables and 16% of fruits consumed being domestically produced.

WWF, 2022: 50% of the UK’s pork is imported, whilst the figure is
30% for beef and around a quarter for lamb and poultry. Major meat supplying
countries to the UK are Denmark, Germany and the Netherlands for pork; Ireland
for beef; and the Netherlands and Thailand for poultry and poultry products. A proportion of UK production is also exported, including up to a third of sheep
and pig meat, and just under 20% of cattle and poultry

Not being able to afford food

Food foundation record this every few months: https://foodfoundation.org.uk/initiatives/food-insecurity-tracking#tabs/Round-14 and have been doing so since 2020

Minor points

• Food security in terms of hunger, nutrition and instability aren't really impacted by rising meat prices. People don't have to eat as much meat as they do. Whilst this isn't a winning argument, we should not let them normalise current levels of meat consumption