Can Britain feed itself?
With all this talk of becoming a self-serving independent island that don’t need no trade deal, we decided it was about time to see just how independent our food production could be. Can we really feed ourselves or are we the student that ends up getting scurvy after six months of solely eating beans on toast?
Here are the basic criteria for England’s self-sufficient food production…
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A Willing Work Force
“That’s going to be a problem for dairy and veg sectors after Brexit” Says Bertie Newman, Dairy farmer. “Most of the milkers are immigrants, regardless of that I do think UK citizens should have the first call on jobs.” In a letter addressed to the Brexit minister, David Davis, the National Farmers Union stressed that “We need to be prepared to explore all the possible options in maintaining access to horticulture’s vital labour supply. This could involve some form of visa-restricted access to labour. We need to investigate the specifics to ensure we have the workforce this industry needs.”
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Sufficient Space and Sustainability
Britain currently grows 60% of its food. “We could grow more it’s the fact we don’t need to that stops us, such as embargos on lamb for example” says Farmer Newman. Mary Durling, small scale farmer, believes that we do not have the space required to sustain our current appetite; “With rising population we will need more space in the future, but if we all ate more plants and less meat space wouldn’t be such a problem”.
Theoretically we have plenty of space to farm industrially, but if we don’t want our countryside covered with industrial farms that are often polluting, we must look for alternatives; family run farms, small-scale farms, organic means of production. Sustainability must be one of our criteria when finding our long-term solution.
According to a study carried out by land rights campaigner Simon Fairlie for Land Magazine UK “organic livestock-based agriculture, practised by orthodox methods and without supplementary measures, has the most difficulty sustaining the full UK population on the land available, while other management systems can do so with a more or less comfortable margin.” So whilst we could sustain ourselves with organic small scale farming (which is nice ) the likelihood that this will ever be the case is slim as it relies on a more localized economy which is something far removed from where we are today. Jyoti Fernandes aptly explains this shift of culture in her comparison between England’s farming habits and the growing middle class of India having moved away from farming. Both of our cultures and populations have become largely disconnected from their “natural resource base” shifting from an “agrarian economy to one based on consumerism”.
Dairy Farmer Newman believes “It’s a nice idea but small scale farms do not have the finances to function on a profit. Farming is an expensive business; tractors start at £50,000. Industrial farming is the way forward but that does not mean we cannot be sustainable.”
Britain first began importing food in 1800, by 1871 Britain was importing 40% of its food. Using history as an example it is hard to believe that anything less than a war could drive Britain into total self-sufficiency and even then, not totally. In 1930’s Britain before the outbreak of the Second World War Britain imported 70% of its food. During WW2 we returned once more to the family run farms that had long since once provided the majority of our food. With difficulty, and rationing, we grew two thirds of our food during world war two on small-scale farms and importing the other third from allies. Since then we have had a population boom and a drastic decline in working family farms, with more than half closing over the last thirty years.
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Fair Policy, Food Security and Developed Technology
In his exploration of the topic Karl Mathieson, editor of Climate home found that; ‘The Food security is far more complex and relies on revising many of the UK’s agricultural policies. Some of these are related to production. The UK has failed to invest enough in agricultural research over the past few decades; meaning home-grown techniques and technologies to sustainably increase production have not been developed. But increased production can also conflict with a healthy environment or the survival of small farms. These “externalities” must be addressed in order to provide long-term food security and are more important than the raw amount of food grown.’
The common agricultural policy “serves some more than others” says Mary Durling. She believes that land subsidies are illogically divided and only benefit the wealthy. “To receive land subsidies you must own over five hectors, yet if you own a horse, not even a working horse, you receive subsidies regardless. At the moment the Queen gets 9m a year in land subsidies.” This is discouraging to small farms who already face a barrage of laws that don’t lend themselves to small scale farming such as ‘The Swill Ban’ which does not allow pig farmers to feed their livestock scraps from a domestic kitchen as it may spread disease if the pig eats the flesh of another animal, something that any self-respecting farmer would leave out of the swill bucket anyhow. Farmer Durling’s sentiment on Agricultural Policy is shared by Farmer Newman who believes the subsidies don’t support farming, only land owners; “some of the land owners live off the subsidies they receive for the farming that goes on their land and the farmers don’t see any of it.” Newman believes subsidies should be given as rewards for “responsible, environmentally friendly farming”.
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A Market for Seasonal Food
There is one thing that all of the farmers I have spoken to agree on, our insatiable and spoilt appetite for out of season food. “People just don’t know what is in season when anymore, they haven’t the knowledge and if they did they would probably ignore it. The culture needs to change, so people don’t eat strawberries out of season, they wait until they are in season.” You only have to look at the mass hysteria of the ‘2017 Iceberg Lettuce Rationing’ to know this is more than true. Until there is a mindful change in people’s eating habits Britain is unlikely to satisfy the nation with it’s avocado-less harvest.
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Conclusion
Living in the climate that we do, it’s inevitable that some of our food will be imported. It is unlikely that any trade deal we do or do not make as a result of Brexit will leave us without imported food. “Imported food might cost more” says Farmer Newman, “but that won’t stop people buying it, they’re not going to stop selling us their Audi’s so why would they stop selling us vegetables.” That gives us one less thing to worry about hey!?