Declare a ‘Farming Crisis and Food Security Emergency’
A Request for Parish Councils and Local Authorities to Declare a ‘Farming Crisis and Food Security Emergency’ and to Adopt a ‘Food Security Restoration Policy’ to Address the Problem.
Adoption of a Food Security Restoration Policy.
In the same way that The National Planning Policy Framework can be used to push through development on the basis of a ‘national need for infrastructure’ the declaration of a farming crisis and food security emergency can be used to push through the implementation of a ‘Food Security Restoration Policy’. This would bind support for local food production into all future decision making processes undertaken by any local authority who adopted it.
This requires:
a) it first be proven that there is indeed justification to declare a ‘farming crisis and food security emergency’.
b) given that it can be proven, a vote by the organisation in question to declare a ‘farming crisis and food security emergency’ must be held and passed. (Motion to declare determined by a majority vote in favour).
c) following the successful passing of a motion to declare a ‘farming crisis and food security emergency’ a second vote must be held to adopt a ‘Food Security Restoration Policy’ (again determined by simple majority). This would bind ‘an active duty of consideration towards support for local farming and food security’ into all future decision making processes undertaken by the organisation in question until such time as maximum agricultural self sufficiency and local food system resilience has been restored.
The Importance of the Food Security Restoration Policy.
The signing by local authorities’ of a food security restoration policy will give them a policy framework counterbalance with which to reject any decision which compromises agricultural production such as the use of farmland for commercial power generation from solar projects. At present no such mechanism exists within local government and therefore pro food security councillors face an uphill battle in the decision making process when working against a previously established climate emergency influenced policy framework.
Many councils have self declared a climate emergency through their membership to the organisation uk100.org and this has reinforced support at the local level for the wave of net zero justified attacks on our food security (subsidy payments overly focused on environmental ‘emissions reduction’ schemes at the expense of core food production, solar farms, carbon offset forestry, proposed re-wilding mandates, fertiliser taxes etc). Of course by making such a declaration without acknowledgement or reference to the body of contrary scientific opinion regarding man made global warming (such as The climate Declaration at clintel.org) these councils could be accused of institutional bias or even seen to be guilty of pre determination within their decision making process, something which could lead to them being considered not fit for purpose and not capable of objective strategic planning in any other capacity. The legal campaign of bringing such organisations to task over their climate emergency declarations will however take a significant amount of time and money. What we need right now is a policy framework counterbalance, something that is quick and easy to adopt and something that will have an immediate positive protective effect on food security through support for farming and local food production, hence the proposal for parish councils and other local authorities to adopt a food restoration policy.
Data in support of a case for the declaration of a farming and food security crisis.
The following three pieces of data which come from various DEFRA reports are in my opinion sufficient to make such a declaration as they clearly demonstrate the rapid decline in both our food security and the financial viability of the agricultural sector.
1. Production to consumption of native crops is now down to 73%. This was at 95% in 1985. Native crop production has therefore been falling at an average rate of 5.5%/decade for the last 4 decades. Source DEFRA UK Food Security Index 2024
2. Return on investment in the farming sector is on average 0.5%. Output prices are so low and input costs so high that very little money is being made. Every £1 million pounds worth of asset will only generate an annual profit of £5k. Source DEFRA Balance Sheet Analysis 2022/2023 Nov 2nd 2024.
3. The percentage of agricultural holdings not making a profit has tripled in 3 years. In 2022 10% made a loss, in 2023 it increased to 17% and in 2024 it was reported at 30%. Source DEFRA Agriculture in the UK 2022 report, DEFRA Farm Business Income by Type of Farm in England 2022/2023 Nov 14th 2024.
Many more examples such as these can be found however in my opinion no other data is needed to declare a farming and food security crisis. The above 3 points clearly show an industry in financial distress and they clearly show our failing food security through decreasing levels of domestic production.
We therefore call upon any organisation served by this document to declare a ‘Farming Crisis and Food Security Emergency’ and to adopt the following ‘Food Security Restoration Policy’ at the earliest opportunity.
The ‘Food Security Restoration Policy’ states that:
‘We accept that our country is now experiencing falling levels of domestic food production. This is introducing unnecessary levels of third party risk to us through our increased reliance on imported foods. Relying on the abilities of other countries to produce and safely transport our food to us in geo politically unstable times is a risk, one that should be reserved only for crops that we are unable to produce here in the UK climate. We therefore accept we need to improve our food security and hereby seek to implement a policy which supports the restoration of maximum agricultural self sufficiency and food system resilience for our local area.
As elected representatives we acknowledge the duty of care we hold to our constituents and recognise we must protect them from risk or harm wherever possible. We agree that a rising level of food security risk caused by a loss of agricultural self sufficiency does represent a real and actual threat of harm to our communities. We therefore agree that maintaining maximum food security for our local communities is an issue that falls within the duty of care held to our constituents through our oath of office as an organisation. We declare we are duty bound and justified to act in the defence of the communities we administer and therefore seek to tackle the threat of our increased dependence on imported food as quickly as possible.
‘We declare that we are in a farming crisis and food security emergency and hereby adopt this food security restoration policy. This will bind us to observe a priority in favour of farming and food production in our local area within the decision making process of this organisation until such time as our production to consumption of native crops (as reported via data from DEFRA) is fully restored to 100%.’
Please discuss this document within your organisation. I urge you to vote on a motion to declare a ‘Farming Crisis and a Food Security Emergency’ and providing that is passed to then vote on a motion to adopt the above ‘Food Security Restoration Policy’ into the decision making framework within your organisation. Please stand with our farmers and local growers, we must restore our self reliance, our food security is our national security.
Peter Lawrence
Farmers Movement Cornwall
https://farmersmovementcornwall.co.uk
https://www.facebook.com/groups/924829825688596