A report has warned that urgent action is needed to secure the UK’s food supply in the face of climate change-induced extreme weather, the imposition of tariffs and global insecurity.
Days after the US president, Donald Trump, warned Europe would be next for tariffs on trade after he imposed tax levies on Canada, China and Mexico, the report said the UK’s post-second world war food system was no longer fit for purpose, and the country’s food security was in a precarious state.
Eight years after the UK’s Brexit vote, the country still had no coherent food policy, despite the fact that nearly a third of our food still comes from the EU. Tim Lang, emeritus professor of food policy at City St George’s, University of London, who is the report’s author, called for new legislation to ensure the state was obliged to feed the public in a time of crisis.
Increased domestic production is needed, as well as changes to food distribution systems, the introduction of town-to-town food resilience education exchanges, and research into current thinking around stockpiling and rationing in order to better prepare the country for food shocks, according to the report by the National Preparedness Commission.
“To safeguard our future, we must prioritise resilience at every level – from local communities to national frameworks,” said Lang.
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“There is a gap between the official risk and resilience framework which presents a picture that all is OK, and the realities that people in senior and frontline roles read differently.
“There is too much complacency about UK food security and civil food resilience barely features at all in forward planning.”
Acute shocks to food supplies were coming to the fore, according to the report’s authors, such as the impact of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, a major global exporter of wheat, corn and sunflower oil, the economic disruption from Covid-19, unexpected trade route disruptions, such as the Black Sea being mined or Houthis attacking ships in the Red Sea, and extreme weather which made domestic home harvests last year the second worst since 1983.
More than 70 people from the food industry, the government, academia and community groups were interviewed about the risks, fragilities, options and recommendations for how to improve food system resilience.
In particular they provided advice on how to help communities prepare for and withstand food shortages and other crises in supply.
The report highlighted the potential of copying grassroots initiatives, which are often working ahead of central government to ensure communities are resilient to shocks to food supplies.
Story was adapted from the Guardian.
