Tightening environmental standards for British farmers while importing food produced to lower standards risks making eco-friendly food an unaffordable luxury item, farmers have said.
At the Oxford Farming Conference on Thursday, the environment secretary, Steve Barclay, announced that the government would consult on a new labelling scheme that would single out food produced to UK standards, allowing consumers to choose more environmentally friendly food.
Barclay also announced a rise in new post-Brexit environmental farming payments, aimed at encouraging more farmers to make nature-friendly choices on their land.
However, farmers and retailers fear that raising environmental standards in the UK while importing from countries with lower standards will cause British farmers to be undercut and pushed out of business, and high quality British food to be an expensive luxury.
Joe Stanley, a farmer and chair of the Leicestershire branch of the National Farmers’ Union, said of the labelling policy: “It’d be easier to get more excited about this were it coming from a government which hadn’t made it a guiding principle of trade policy since 2016 to source the cheapest, most environmentally damaging produce from wherever it could be found, undercutting UK farm standards.”
Since Brexit, the government has struck deals with Australia, Mexico and Canada, raising fears meat such as pork and beef produced to lower animal welfare and environmental standards will be imported into the UK.
A report launched at the conference, written by the retail expert Ged Futter, says cheap imports risk putting sustainable British farms at a disadvantage. The report states: “There is a belief from UK retailers that there is a sea of plenty out there and if they lose a UK grower, they can just replace it with an import.”
Last year, a UK egg market collapse meant Polish eggs flooded the market. Growers cited in the report say the government has not supported them in reaching environmental and net zero targets, which “tied the growers’ hands behind their backs straight away so we can’t compete” with countries that produce cheaper food to lower standards.
James Robinson, a dairy farmer who runs a family farm in Cumbria and chairs the Nature Friendly Farming Network in England, said he was frustrated with the government’s approach.
He said: “It is incredibly frustrating, and very disappointing given the promises that are always made by the government and never actually come to fruition. Michael Gove stood up and said that we won’t undermine our farmers within trade deals, and then our first trade deal was exactly that. But that isn’t any reason for us to lower our standards. Absolutely no reason at all. Just because there’s some cheap product coming in with lower standards should not mean we should lower our own either.”
Robinson said farmers needed “support from retailers and the whole supply chain” to prevent them being undercut by lower quality imports.
Lucinda Langton, the head of sustainability at Marks and Spencer, said she was concerned about farmers being undercut and the company was taking measures to ensure imported food products sold by it were produced to similar standards to those in the UK.
Craig Bennett, the chief executive of the Wildlife Trusts, said: “We should not be allowing imports of foods that are produced to lower standards than the UK environmental standards. And it’s been incredibly disappointing how the government has broken their own promises on this issue over the last five years.”
Barclay refused to comment on the issue of undercutting farmers with imports, but said on labelling: “It’s in direct response to feedback that I’ve received from the farming sector, where I have a very rapid consultation. And of course we can look at if there’s any risks of unintended consequences in doing that, but the fundamental principle for me is, how do we empower consumers?”
