Climate Change and Biodiversity: Food Security

Baroness Jones of Whitchurch Excerpts

Thursday 8th September 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, for this timely debate, at a time of growing concern about rising food prices and increasing food shortages. I add my welcome to the noble Baroness, Lady Willis, who comes with a significant reputation already. We know that she will make a major contribution to the environmental debates that we will be involved with. This debate is also timely because we have a new Prime Minister, a new BEIS Secretary of State, and a new Defra Secretary of State. We are all anxious to know what their plans are for the environment. I have to say that, so far, it is not looking good.

Of course, Liz Truss has been the Defra Secretary of State before, so I was keen to see what she made of it last time. I googled her record. In the two years that she held the post she never made one keynote speech and gave the impression that she could not wait to leave. What we do know is that in that period she cut the Environment Agency’s budget so much that it became unable to act against water polluters, a legacy that we are still living with today.

Today, she announced the opening of new oil and gas licence applications, and the lifting of the ban on fracking. She is also cutting the green levy, which was introduced to help energy companies fast-track to renewable energy growth. As a result, our progress towards delivering net zero by 2050 is in danger of going into reverse. Can the Minister please tell us whether the PM is still committed to the net-zero target? If so, what steps is she proposing to take to achieve it, given that we are already behind on the current targets and her emphasis on gas and fracking will make matters worse? Given that she has made great play of her plans to rip up remaining EU legislation, where does that leave the retained environmental legislation, such as the habitats and birds directives, which underpin our current biodiversity strategy?

One of the reasons there is so much uncertainty about the future is that Defra lacks a coherent plan to deliver its climate change and biodiversity strategies. The Committee on Climate Change and the Commons EFRA Committee have consistently criticised the department’s approach to this. As they have said, a long-term strategy is required to prepare the agriculture sector for the risks and opportunities that arise from climate change, including higher temperatures, drought and increases in the spread of pests and diseases.

We have seen the huge impacts that arise from extreme weather globally, in the devastating droughts and fires in Australia and the loss of life and homes in the recent Pakistani floods. Clearly, the droughts that we faced this summer are a portent of things to come. The result is lower yields of crops, livestock being fed winter feed as the dried-out grass cannot sustain them, and poor horticulture outputs. This is impacting the bottom line of farmers and growers at a time when fertiliser and energy costs are already making their businesses increasingly unviable. So I ask the Minister: where is the Defra plan to help farmers adapt to the challenges of climate change, so that they can play their full part in delivering net zero?

We already know that the water companies are failing to play their part. We clearly need a strategy to preserve the increasingly scarce and precious water supplies that exist. This means building more reservoirs for storage and fixing the leaks in existing pipework. Farmers and growers need to know what is expected of them from future water use.

A couple of years ago, I spent the day with Norfolk farmers, who are growing many of the fruit and vegetables that feed the nation. They had been told by the Environment Agency that their access to the local aquifer was about to be restricted, as it was running low. Their argument, which was well made, was that if they had been given longer notice of this change, they could have invested in their own water supply units. They simply did not have time to adapt, given the short notice they were given. These are the sorts of challenges that producers across the country are facing.

We know that much bigger changes in agricultural practices will be needed to meet our climate change obligations, including a switch away from livestock farming. This has the twin advantage of also improving the nation’s health. But where is the Defra plan to reduce our share of carbon emissions from agriculture? We are falling badly behind the necessary targets.

Meanwhile, as Minette Batters has said, proposals to help farmers increase food production have been stripped to the bone. We know that costs are rising dramatically for farmers and food producers, putting further pressure on food price inflation. The closure of the UK’s biggest fertiliser plant will add to costs, as will its impact on the supply of CO₂. At the same time, tonnes of food are being left rotting in the field and over 40,000 pigs have been culled, simply because of labour shortages—a problem of the Government’s own making. Our farmers are increasingly being undercut by low-quality imports from abroad.

Where is the plan to support British farmers to increase local food production and ensure that British food is affordable? The Committee on Climate Change flagged up the possibility of a major switch to produce food more suitable to hot, dry climates, such as peaches, apricots, tea, sunflowers, sweet potatoes, watermelons, walnuts and, of course, wine. Is this the future the Government see for horticulture? There is huge popular support for the notion that we should become more self-sufficient in food production in the UK. The increasing food scarcities from war and drought will exacerbate that need, so why do the Government not aim to increase our home-grown production of vegetables beyond the current 54%? Why do we not incentivise planting more fruit trees as part of our tree planting strategy? At a local level, why do we not encourage communities and individuals to grow more of their own food in gardens and public spaces?

Last week, volunteers on my allotment picked six crates of apples and pears to give to FareShare. This is, in effect, free food, and we should replicate that model in communities wherever we can.

Of course, we did have a comprehensive food strategy that began to address these issues. The Dimbleby report set out a comprehensive road map that would have allowed us to fix the broken food system and provide more nutritious and accessible food for the nation. Sadly, as we have debated before, the Government’s response was late and totally inadequate.

The truth is that the Government have failed to deliver a food strategy, are failing on our climate change commitments and are failing farmers. I suspect that they will be punished—rightly—by rural communities at the next election. I look forward to hearing what the Minister has to say, but I doubt there is much he can do to stop that inevitability.