A Parliamentary committee has highlighted the need for food security against a background of climate change mitigation and policies to protect the environment.
Environmental change and food security is the latest report from the cross-party Environment Audit Committee of the House of Commons. It argues that food security is a public good and should be central to the Land Use Framework due to be adopted in England.
The report notes that environmental change threatens to weaken food security, but that the food system itself is one of the biggest drivers of climate change and nature loss.
Therefore, government policies must help adapt food and farming systems to become more resilient to the effects of climate change and biodiversity loss, while at the same time mitigating their impacts on the food system and limiting the damage to the environment caused by the food system.
The Committee recommends twelve actions to achieve this in the UK. It calls for a new “cross-government, cross-sector food security body that brings together all the actors in the food system to examine and make policy recommendations on long-term food resilience and environmental issues”. This echoes the AIC’s similar call for an independent food security body made in its
The MPs also call for government to publish an annual food security report, rather than the three yearly one set out in the Agriculture Act; and to uphold standards for the environmental impacts of food production in its trading relationships with other countries. There should be a government strategy to prevent and reduce waste in the food system.
Government should establish baseline metrics and tools for food sustainability, including soil health, carbon sequestration, biodiversity net gain and carbon credits. This should be supported by more detailed advice on soil health.
Water will become critical to food production. The Committee recommends a system to transport water more easily and quickly between regions across the UK, with more use of precision irrigation technology across the UK farming system; and a plan to increase water storage on farm by two thirds by 2050.
There should be a government priority list for agricultural innovation and R&D to provide clarity for researchers, industry and investors, plus a strategy for technological innovation in food production.
“Finally, and perhaps most importantly, for farmers to transition their businesses to the most environmentally friendly practices, their options need to be commercially viable and they must have access to high-quality, locally tailored support and advice,” recommends the Environment Audit Committee.
“The Committee welcomes the government’s progress on food security so far, not least in its intention to publish a Land Use Framework which will be welcome guidance to manage the competing demands on our land,” says Committee chair Philip Dunne MP. “However, this Framework is long overdue, and the government must prioritise and publish it this year. It is clear to the Committee that food security must be a central tenet: delivering this promptly could make a critical difference in transforming the government’s ambition for food into reality.
“The government must make clear how and when it will establish common standards for sustainability metrics. Without these, the agricultural sector will be unable to plan for the future. And where fast-developing technologies have the potential to transform agriculture, such as futuristic vertical farms or recycled non-fossil fuel fertilisers, the government should set out how it will trial, regulate and democratise these new technologies.
“Food security is clearly a public good and should become an explicit goal of the ELM schemes to incentivise farmers to champion a sustainable food system. Food security cannot be an optional extra; the government must give the sector the leadership it needs, or risk holding back the UK’s clear potential to deliver a resilient and secure food system,” Mr Dunne concludes.