Parkinson's Patter - 'The only thing we learn from history, is that we don't learn from history'

On Sunday the 1st of March things were relatively ok, yes it was wet through outside, but the green shoots of spring were making themselves known. The grass was growing and the sheep were showing signs of overcoming their expensive hay addiction they had owned since November. Crops were showing promise of good yield potential (a treacherous statement I know). At this point, by my standards anyway, I may have been experiencing a small outbreak of optimism for the coming year.

Then on Monday the 2^nd things changed when I turned on the radio while making my first cup of coffee, I listened as reports of the antics of the ‘tangerine scream’ Donald Trump in Iran. My optimistic bubble burst there and then.

As with the Russian offensive against Ukraine, the markets have a well-rehearsed playbook with oil, extending to other commodities such as fertiliser, the longer the conflicts continue. We saw the general public sit up a little at the start of the covid pandemic when it was realised that food supply chains for supermarkets may be affected. I remember too well having slight anxiety about toilet roll, which in hindsight (no pun intended), should have been the least of my worries.

This country is in a precarious position when it comes to food security, only 60% self-sufficient. The supermarket shelves reflect this, with what would have been considered luxury imported items 60 years ago being part of everyday diets.  Plant-based diets underpinned by soya are heavily reliant on imports, as the plant breeders are yet to find soya that thrives in our climate, with only 2000ha grown in the UK at present. What to do? Would it be difficult to convert the population back to eating seasonally, with what would be considered a limited and dull diet. Blackadder’s Baldrick and his infatuation with turnips springs to mind.  I do think it would address some of the obesity issues the country has though.

So, what are we good at growing? Cereals, root crops, fruit, oilseeds, sugar beet and vegetables. In the parts where the soils, climate or topography dictate that the former can’t be grown, we can grow grass to sustain sheep and cattle for beef and milk and its by-products. Pigs, chicken and eggs can be produced intensively and their manures returned to the soils to lessen the reliance on artificial fertilisers. We are surrounded by water, in which both wild and farmed fish are in abundance.  Let’s not forget all the beers and spirits we produce and the increasing occurrence of British wines. When written down it doesn’t sound quite as bland a diet as I previously imagined.

Problem solved then? Well not quite, as the countryside has a side battle going on that doesn’t involve Trump. The battle of land for food production vs land for houses, infrastructure, and energy. I have lived in Warwickshire since 1989 and the housing developments on greenfield sites mean that once small villages are now verging on small towns that join up to the large towns and eventually to the cities. These houses aren’t on those fields that were considered a bit rubbish and struggled to grow a good crop, no, they are on decent land that could be used for grass, arable and sometimes roots.  Most of the land around me is earmarked for development.  I only hope that I am not around if it ever comes to fruition.  Let’s add in transport infrastructure for these houses, new roads to accommodate the 2 cars most of these houses have take up more land. Then of course there is HS2 that has cut through the countryside like a blunt knife leaving a horrific wound in its wake.

Another invading army involved in the battle is energy. Land for food vs land for fuel, ‘green energy’.  Here, solar panels are planned for the land where the planned houses aren’t.  Luckily, we aren’t suited to wind turbines but increasing areas of energy crops are being grown, mainly due to the better returns offered by the people who own the digesters.

There is another aspect here that almost slipped my mind.  Farmers are being incentivised NOT to grow food.  Through the Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI), farmers can be paid for taking land out of production and growing wildflowers.  It looks great and it’s an easy option that doesn’t involve being at the mercy of world markets when growing to earn a living.

When food became scarce during the second world war, draconian measures through the War agricultural executive committee or ‘the war-ag’ as it was commonly known were introduced which forced farmers and landowners to use all their suitable, and sometimes non-suitable land for crop production to feed the hungry nation. I fear the 1.7 million acres that were brought back to production from 1939-1940 just aren’t there any longer.

As a nation, we need to get back to eating seasonally, cooking from scratch and reducing food waste.  Who remembers the days when the Sunday chicken lasted 3 or so days, with the final incarnation being soup? Education does play a key part here, as understandably skills have been lost over the years, why plan and cook when a tap on the phone has calorie heavy sustenance at your door within minutes.

There is a saying, ‘the only thing we learn from history is that we don’t learn from history’. We cannot afford to take our food security for granted. The pressures of global politics, shifting markets, and competing demands on land are not distant issues, they are already shaping what we can grow, what we can eat, and how resilient we are as a nation. While the solutions are neither simple nor comfortable, they may lie in rediscovering a more grounded way of living, valuing our farmland, supporting those who produce our food, and changing our habits to waste less and rely more on what we can sustainably produce.

Duncan Parkinson - Agriculture Client Manager