Twenty-seven businesses from across the food supply chain have called on the government to act on UK food production.
The businesses, including the major multiples, suppliers including Noble Foods, 2 Sisters and Barfoots, and the NFU, have written to the farming minister.
They have outlined how Defra and the wider government can work with them to deliver growth across the food sector.
It comes after the NFU convened a Food Resilience Roundtable which Angela Eagle MP attended on her second day as Defra secretary alongside representatives from retailers, processors and farm businesses.
“Food is such a fundamental part of our lives and our society, and the government has rightly said that ‘food security is national security’,” said NFU president Tom Bradshaw. “We want to go further than this – we want to be a driving force behind Britain’s economic renewal, and every person who signed this letter agrees that our sector has real potential for growth.”
The roundtable highlighted the need for a clear government ambition for homegrown food production, just as it had for the environment through legislated targets, the NFU said.
It also called on the developing Food Strategy to focus on the resilience of the UK’s food system.
The letter to the minister outlined three areas that food businesses believe will support this work, including changes to the planning system, improved tax relief to stimulate investment and growth, and enabling access to the right people for skilled work.
“Resilience and confidence have to underpin this, with a clear framework of enabling policy and targeted investment,” said Bradshaw. “Setting defined government targets for domestic food production will provide the certainty and direction our farmers and growers need – balancing food production with the targets that already exist for protecting the environment.
“The UK’s food sector is ready to work with the new farming minister to deliver this; to strengthen our food security, help mitigate some of the current inflationary pressures and build a thriving rural economy.”
Farming profitability continues to fall
This comes as new research has revealed that profitability in the combinable crop sector is projected to fall below its long-term trend due to lower incomes and higher costs.
The research from the Nix Farm Management Pocketbook also found that livestock sectors were performing relatively well, based on high prices and low feed costs but with much less profit from subsidy.
The dairy sector was set to continue a period of relatively strong profits, with high milk price, it added.
Many farmers, especially arable farmers, would be dependent on their diversified activities this season, with many reallocating resources away from farming activities at the detriment of food production.
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