Poultry sector growth plan risks UK national security, campaigners warn | Farming

Campaigners have warned that the government’s planned poultry sector growth plan poses a risk to national security.

Earlier this month, Environment Minister Emma Reynolds told the Groundswell farming festival that the key to improving food security was to consume more homegrown produce, which is why the government had set up the Agriculture and Food Partnership Board, whose members include industry leaders such as the president of the National Farmers’ Union and the president of the Food and Drink Federation.

Reynolds said: “I would like to see us use the different tools of government and the board to really increase the level of food production in the UK.”

At a parliamentary committee hearing earlier this month, the environment minister said one of the biggest obstacles to growth in the poultry sector was planning restrictions. The Guardian previously revealed ministers were rewriting planning rules to make it easier to set up intensive livestock farms despite concerns about water pollution, air quality and local opposition.

But the focus on growth in the poultry sector to tackle food security has faced strong criticism. Ruth Westcott, campaign manager for better food and farming union Sustain, said the plan to produce more poultry in the UK was not a solution but a risk to UK food security.

“Intensive poultry farming can never be a solution to food security because it is extremely resource-intensive, polluting and inefficient,” Westcott said.

Campaign group Communities Against Factory Farming (CAFF) is calling on the government to scrap its poultry farming plan and focus on homegrown protein sources such as legumes, legumes, nuts and beans.

“The government’s own national security assessment warns that ‘current levels of animal farming are unsustainable without imports, with soy from South America accounting for 18% of animal feed produced,’” CAFF campaign leader Maya Pardo said. “Along with the destruction of the Amazon rainforest to feed factory-farmed chickens, over-reliance on animal feed imports also leaves us vulnerable to supply chain shocks and ecosystem collapse, which is a national security issue.”

Concerns about the UK’s food security have been voiced far and wide. Last month the government’s farming roadmap set out its long-term vision for the farming sector over the next 25 years, including a vital focus on food security, warning of geopolitical instability as the climate crisis, environmental degradation and supply chain disruptions are already affecting the UK’s food security. It warned that this could increase the risk of “serious food price shocks” and in some “extreme cases lead to reduced availability of certain foods”.

This language is reminiscent of a recent report by the United Kingdom’s senior national security officials, which warned that national security was under serious threat from the climate crisis and the looming collapse of vital natural ecosystems, with food shortages and economic potential only a few years away.

Just this month, Italian coffee company Lavazza warned that coffee prices would remain high for years to come due to geopolitical tensions and the climate crisis driving up costs.

Riverford’s regenerative farming leader Harriet Bell said the organic veg box company welcomed planning reform to help farmers invest in reservoirs, renewable energy and polytunnels, but said planning reform “should not be a free pass for developments that undermine healthy water systems, biodiversity or animal welfare”.

The government’s farming roadmap reveals that green farming systems can sustain or improve food production while strengthening resilience and reducing reliance on fertiliser. Bell said if ministers were serious about food security, the upcoming organic action plan for England should play a “key role in turning that ambition into reality”.

“In the long term, food production depends on healthy soils, healthy water systems and biodiversity as much as increasing production,” he said.

Tim Benton, professor of population ecology at the University of Leeds, said food security will soon become the “organising principle” of agricultural policy.

In a volatile world that is becoming increasingly unstable, he said the government must move away from a risk register focused on identifying specific events and instead acknowledge: “We are in a new world where events have always happened and will always happen.”