Food Security – Never More Important than Now

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 12th, 2023 at 3:54 pm

People need to eat to survive.  For that reason, I remain confident in farming in Yorkshire, whatever the weather, the politicians, or the rest of the world throw at us.

Never forget that a crowd is only three meals from being a riot.  Hungry people do desperate  things to survive.

I have long banged the drum for retaining a good level of self sufficiency in this country.  Just as we are now looking to renewable energy to take away our reliance on oil, so we should look to farming in this country to provide a secure food supply for our population so that we can never be held to ransom by a foreign power.

If the lesson has not been learnt from what has happened in the Ukraine over the past 18 months, then look at Israel and its treatment of the Palestinians to really learn that lesson.  We should not be dependent on others for our daily bread.

This should not be at the expense of farming to help the environment, but it should have a priority within that decision making.  Within our current policies, we are primarily focussed on ensuring that the environmentalists achieve their targets within our current policies, and those going through the SFI application process at present will experience this.  But we should not be forgetting about food production and security.

HS2 had grown to take one third of the Department of Transport budget, and at over £50billion had become too big to fail.  But if something is wrong there is a time to stand up and say so and our current Prime Minister has done so.

Whilst I welcome many of our environmental initiatives and I am not blind to climate change, I ask whether it is time to refocus our priorities and work in tandem with food production to ensure we do not have any food shortages in this country in the future.

The population of this country need to eat, and for that reason I remain confident in our industry in this period of change.

Whilst that will involve change, and not just doing what you have always done, it should be managed change rather than panicked change.  We are here to help advise you through these changing times.

Rod Cordingley BSc FRICS FAAV

Tel: 01904 489731

Email: rlc@stephenson.co.uk