William Waterfield (Andover)    

‘Agriculture’s Defining Decade’ was the title of the recent Institute of Agricultural Management annual conference where the subject of food production and the environment was under discussion.  One of the key points made by Minette Batters in her opening remarks was that the lack of government direction around food security was a major issue failing to provide any guide or priorities for the sector.  Food security was a theme taken up by Tim Laing with an emphasis that the problems are clear and becoming more extensive and starker. The problems with the agri-food supply chain, unlike most other industries, are multiple requiring integrated, across departmental thinking.  Tim Laing went on bluntly to say that solving the current situation would require a rebuilding of biodiversity, changing diets dramatically, shortening supply chains and recalibrating food culture.

When it came to climate change Lord Deben, (John Gummer former Secretary of State for the Environment) chair of the Independent Climate Change Committee was no more encouraged by the government’s actions towards Net Zero than Tim Laing had been on food policy. Although he did emphasise that the focus needs to be on reducing carbon dioxide and thinking that reducing methane would solve the problem was plainly misguided.

It was not all doom and gloom with interesting presentations on the rapid growth in Europe of the use of insect larvae as a protein source to replace soya in animal diets.  The UK is lagging behind and needs new legislation to enable the roll out of this technology.  Vertical farming seems set to be with us as technology which brings down the cost of production and improves UK food security.  When it came to the environment and Natural Capital there was an interesting presentation showing how the conversion of less productive land to environmental options was benefitting individual businesses, although the question of who owns Natural Capital remains an interesting one.

There was consensus that farmers and land owners need to understand their current situation when it came to both carbon emissions/sequestration and Natural Capital.  If one wants to be able to benefit from these issues, it is important to baseline the various issues now and with this knowledge one can set targets.

On climate change, research carried out in Ireland had shown that when grass growth was affected by drought, the more resilient businesses were those with a higher stocking rate.   Carbon trading is seen by many as the great saviour for agricultural incomes.  Actually, defining and trading carbon credits remains the “wild west” with little agreement as to defining reliable and properly audited schemes.  On the other hand, the principle of developers being required to show Biodiversity Net Gain was offering farmers an option to earn long term incomes from some of their poorest land on the farm.

If you want to know more about baselining your carbon position or how you might benefit from Biodiversity Net Gain, please contact William at w.waterfield@fcgagric.com or your local FCG Office.