As the global shockwaves of the Middle East conflict continue to amplify, urgent questions on food security are coming to the fore. From geopolitical instability to the increase in extreme weather events, it’s become increasingly clear that our approach to food security in the UK is not fit for purpose.
Here, the SFT’s Head of Policy, Megan Perry, and Senior Researcher, Robert Barbour, share their thoughts on the current situation and imagine what a future food system that’s more resilient to global shocks and price volatility might look like.
Fears about how the Iran war is impacting food production has now been widely raised by farmers and in the media. The main focus has been the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, through which 20% of the world’s oil and gas and about one third of global seaborne trade in fertilisers passes. Yet there is far more at play, and the lessons and solutions we should be drawing from this seem to be going unrecognised.
Disruption to the gas supply (a critical component of fertiliser manufacture) has further led to fertiliser plants shutting down in countries such as India, Bangladesh and Pakistan. Around a quarter of the world’s rice exports come from India which will be impacted by a prolonged war. Brazil, which imports over 60% of its fertilisers, mostly via the Strait of Hormuz, is one of the world’s biggest exporters of agricultural commodities. Australia’s stock of fertiliser is expected to run out mid-April. US stocks of fertiliser are already 25% lower than usual. The Philippines has declared a national emergency.
It is not just the availability of food that is the issue, but people’s ability to buy it. With the disruption to fuel, many countries are experiencing a shut down in their industries, forcing people out of work. In the Philippines, the widespread Jeepney drivers are facing 50-60% pay cuts. In Gujarat, India, a shortage of gas has led the ceramics industry to close leaving the 400,000 employees without work. In Mumbai, a fifth of hotels and restaurants have been partially closed since the start of March.
This is all set within the backdrop of another major crisis. The United Nations warned last week that the earth’s climate is in a state of emergency and is “more out of balance than at any time in observed history”. Yet the environmental impact of the Iran war is catastrophic. It is draining the global carbon budget faster than 84 countries combined, with 5 million tonnes of GHG emissions released within the first 14 days alone.
Patrick Bigger, a research director at the Climate and Community Institute, was quoted in the Guardian, “Every missile strike is another down payment on a hotter, more unstable planet, and none of it makes anyone safer… Every refinery fire and tanker strike is a reminder that fossil‑fuelled geopolitics is incompatible with a liveable planet. This war shows, yet again, that the fastest way to supercharge the climate crisis is to let fossil fuel interests dictate foreign policy.”
There are also concerns the war will be leveraged to benefit big business or to remove environmental standards and regulation. An article from Greenpeace has said, “Expect the term ‘food security’ to be hollowed out and weaponised. Large-scale industrial players are already positioning themselves as the only thing standing between the public and empty shelves. In truth, it is this highly consolidated, chemical-dependent model of industrial farming that is making our global food system so fragile in the first place.”
How is the situation being addressed in the UK? The UK imports 60% of its fertiliser and close to 50% of its food, often from countries which in turn import significant amounts of fertiliser and rely on input-heavy production systems. The UK’s system is also heavily centralised and consolidated, nine big retailers account for more than 94% of all retail food.
The recently launched Land Use Framework gives an insight to the government’s thinking, namely we will need to produce more food from less land, with a drive to growth and efficiency in sectors such as poultry. George Monbiot does not mince his words on this approach, calling it “nothing short of moronic” given the poultry sector’s dependence on imported livestock feed.
The term ‘resilience’ is also being bandied around by the government and farming sector, but what does this mean? It does not appear to mean a big shift away from input-heavy approaches that dominate today, given the aforementioned focus on continuing to achieve current levels of production. Business as usual and tweaking rather than transforming appears to be the current thinking. But we need much more radical policies.
“The UK imports 60% of its fertiliser and close to 50% of its food, often from countries which in turn import significant amounts of fertiliser and rely on input-heavy production systems. The UK’s system is also heavily centralised and consolidated, 9 big retailers account for more than 94% of all retail food.”
As Professor Tim Benton says in this recent interview, it will likely take a crisis before change really happens. Yet we have the knowledge, resources and ability to transform our food system into one that is both resilient and does not degrade our environment.
If the government created support that took a whole farm approach, integrating nature and food production through agroecological farming methods, and promoted healthier diets aligned with what the UK can sustainably produce, we could move away from input-heavy agriculture, reducing our reliance on imports and increasing the resilience of domestic production to extreme weather. A decentralised supply chain is also critical for true resilience, embedding smaller-scale localised infrastructure across the country would be more flexible, able to pivot in a crisis and be less of a target from a security point of view. Empowering communities to produce food should also be taken seriously, supporting community growing, improving access to growing spaces and embedding practical food growing skills within the curriculum for young people. And we need to address our huge reliance on imported fruit and veg by creating market gardens and horticulture enterprises across the UK, accompanied by localised processing facilities.
In some ways, this is a vision that mirrors the shift that is needed in our energy system – a wholesale transformation to alternative forms of production that will allow us to wean ourselves off fossil fuels, and in so doing improve our resilience to future shocks like the one being experienced today. Unlike the energy transformation, however, a similarly radical shift in the food system is not only failing to happen but is barely recognised as being necessary outside a fairly small circle.
“If the government created support that took a whole farm approach, integrating nature and food production through agroecological farming methods, and promoted healthier diets aligned with what the UK can sustainably produce, we could move away from input-heavy agriculture, reducing our reliance on imports and increasing the resilience of domestic production to extreme weather.”
Much of the media’s commentary on the Iran war has, quite rightly, noted the major impacts it will have on food prices and production, thanks primarily to the effects on nitrogen fertiliser supplies. There has, though, been vanishingly little reporting on how and why a major reduction in our reliance on energy-intensive agrochemical inputs, like nitrogen fertiliser, could tackle this issue moving forwards. Instead, prominent voices have effectively positioned fertiliser supplies, and the maintenance of current levels of food production, as proxies for food security. But this is a dangerous oversimplification, that ignores the various other equally important dimensions of food security and fails to acknowledge the enormous potential that exists to wean ourselves off agrochemicals, and in so doing generate a much deeper degree of resilience in our food system.
None of this will be easy to achieve, of course. But the threats our food system face are potentially catastrophic, and demand urgent and radical action. If we fail to do so, the consequences will be dire. If, however, we rise to meet the challenge – by implementing genuinely regenerative farming practices, adopting healthy diets and putting in place the various enabling policies and infrastructure needed to make this a reality – then we can create a better future for people and the planet alike.
To understand more about how these global dynamics are already playing out on the ground, and what they mean for countries directly impacted by the current conflict, read Zeead Yaghi’s analysis of Lebanon’s growing food crisis.
To hear more from Megan, listen to our most recent episode of the Sustainable Food Trust Podcast, where she joins Patrick and Stuart to talk about food security.
Featured image by Suphanat Khumsap (Getty Images).
