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Secure and sustainable food
Food policy is a priority area of work for us.
- Rising prices and commodity shortages in 2008 highlighted the short and long-term challenges of global food security.
- The 2008 report on food by the Cabinet Office Strategy Unit highlighted the pressures of climate change on food production, the impact the food chain has on the environment, and the health impacts of our diets as just some of the challenges which need to be addressed.
The Government has responded with a number of activities to ensure we have a food strategy fit for the future. We published (10 August 2009) a package of material which invited your views on the future of our food system. The deadline for responses was 16 October.
The material covers UK food security and sustainability. We discuss issues ranging from how we can create a sustainable food system locally and globally, to the challenges arising from the need to feed a rising population more sustainably.
Some of our material is specifically for comment and consultation. Some, like the UK Food Security Assessment, has been the product of our discussions with stakeholders over the past year, and will be subject to review as evidence needs and sources develop.
How it all fits together
Next steps
We have put this package of material together online to gather your thoughts, ideas, views and concerns. We want this feedback to help shape the Government’s food policy agenda, and help us work out what we need to do to tackle some of the pressures, and maximise the opportunities, we are all faced with.
Our aim is to produce a clear strategy, along with an action plan on what Government, Industry and consumers need to do to achieve our goals. We hope to publish this later this year.
Update: 16 October 2009
Our consultations on ‘Food 2030’ and the ‘Development of indicators for a sustainable food system’ are now closed. Thank you for all your contributions whether through the online forum, by e-mail or at meetings that we’ve attended. We will be analysing all comments to feed into our food strategy which we aim to publish early next year.
Contact us
For further information please contact foodpolicyunit@defra.gsi.gov.uk
Background: why do we need to reassess our food policies?
In recent decades, we in the UK have been benefited from a greater choice of food, better labelling and improving food safety. Despite recent price rises, food has, in general, become more affordable over the last thirty years. And over that time global food production has grown consistently faster than population, but with serious environmental costs.
However, we cannot assume that these trends will continue. Nor is there any excuse for complacency about the effects of unsustainable practice in our global food supply chains. There are big challenges looming for the world’s food supply, and we need to ensure we are equipped to meet them.
- To feed a growing global population, it is estimated that global food production will have to increase by some 70% compared to 2005-7 levels by 2050. The world’s ability to grow food depends on global resources - such as soil, energy, water and biodiversity – and we’ll need to expand food production within those environmental limits. In other words, we’ll need to grow more food with fewer resources.
- Food contributes around 18% to UK greenhouse gas emissions. If we are to avoid dangerous levels of climate change we’ll need to reduce these emissions, along with other sources of greenhouse gases.
- Climate change will alter what we can grow where, both in Europe and throughout the world. This isn’t all bad news – there will be benefits for some. But we need to be prepared for, and be able to adapt to, these changes.
- While 1 billion people in the world don’t have enough to eat, in developed countries, like the UK, obesity and diet-related ill-health are increasing problems. It is estimated that the health bill arising from obesity could cost the UK taxpayer billions by 2050 if we do nothing.
See also:
Page last modified: 2 September 2009
Page published: 10 August 2009