Last week, the High Court ruled in favour of a judicial review challenging regulations that remove labelling and traceability from so-called ‘precision bred’ organisms. The judicial review was led by Beyond GM, with Patrick Holden, CEO of the Sustainable Food Trust, and two others standing as co-claimants. Here Patrick reflects on why he chose to speak out and on the importance of the case.

I cannot pretend that I fully understood all the legal arguments when I first agreed to become involved in a judicial review challenging new regulations governing genetically modified ‘precision bred’, organisms (PBOs).

I am a farmer, not a lawyer. What I did understand was that the new regulations, which removed traceability and labelling from certain types of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) would make it harder for producers and consumers who wished to – or had to – avoid genetically engineered organisms to do so.

That seemed wrong to me then and, following the High Court’s judgment last week, it’s clear the Government did not fully consider all the options available or the impacts of a profound change in legislation.

Becoming a claimant in a judicial review is a serious commitment. It required putting my name to a public legal challenge against the Government and accepting a level of scrutiny that many might prefer to avoid. But then again, the core issues of the case led by Beyond GM – the integrity of living organisms and the protection of organic standards – are issues that I have a long history with.

The experience has caused me to reflect not only on the case itself but on how dramatically the debate around genetic engineering has changed since the battles many of us fought in the 1990s. History, it seems, still has some important lessons to teach us.

Lessons to learn

Back in the late 1990s and early noughties, when I was director of the Soil Association, one of the standout campaigns with which I was involved was against the introduction of GMOs.

Our GMO campaign, arguing that the Government should not allow genetically engineered foods to creep into our food system was won, due in no small measure to the massive media attention it attracted, but also because Labour’s Environment Minister, Michael Meacher, was both privately and virtually publicly on our side.

Michael was the one who championed the Farm Scale Evaluations – a series of large-scale trials to test the impact of GM crops on local biodiversity and ecosystems, prior to any commercial approvals. The results raised serious concerns about the environmental consequences of planting GMO crops and undermined claims that they would automatically deliver public benefits.

He paid the political price for doing the right thing.

Coincidentally, I met with him on the day that he was sacked by Tony Blair. “I’ve got some bad news,” he said, “let’s go and have a drink on the Terrace.” It was never stated publicly, but many of us believed his opposition to the Government’s pro-GM policy played a significant role in his departure.

It is heartening to know that one of the last actions Michael took before he passed away, was to stand with Beyond GM on the steps of Number 10, to deliver the ‘Letter from America’ – a plea from American farmers, businesses, food advocates and civil society organisations, representing some 57 million people, for the UK not to follow America’s unquestioning embrace of GMOs.

The empire strikes back

Twenty years later, how things have changed! There is no equivalent to Michael Meacher in the Government. Many of the MPs who waved this legislation through without scrutiny probably couldn’t tell a GMO from their own elbows and are utterly seduced by the idea that we can improve on nature using the great white heat of technology.

After a decisive blow, the industry, or perhaps one might say the empire, has struck back, and very effectively too. It did this in the form of a seemingly innocuous piece of legislation – the Genetic Technology (Precision Breeding) Act of 2023 – which sought to distance GMOs from their past failures by giving them a shiny new name: precision bred organisms (PBOs).

Ask anyone on the street and they likely won’t be able to tell you what a PBO is, yet 8 in 10 people in the UK believe that all GMOs should be labelled and traceable in our food system. This change of law has a major impact on the right to exercise informed choice and to choose not to plant, sell or buy GMOs.

The Act was signed into law by the Conservatives, but it is Labour that passed the Genetic Technology (Precision Breeding) Regulations into law in 2025, which allow the commercial planting and sale of PBO plants.

Despite a feeling of a fait accompli, Beyond GM and its legal team at Leigh Day and Matrix Chambers believed there was still a possible route to challenge what was happening. Not by reversing the primary Act, which would require another Act of Parliament, but by challenging the legality of the regulations made under it.

Taking the fight to court

The gathering of co-claimants was part of an intense and meticulous 13-month effort by Beyond GM and its legal team at Leigh Day and Matrix Chambers.

What was needed was evidence from farmers who could explain how the absence of labelling and traceability would affect their ability to maintain the integrity of organic and non-GM production. Organic farming depends not only on what happens in the field, but on the reliability of the whole chain – seeds, feed, ingredients, certification, trust. Organic farmers are legally obliged to avoid all GMOs, including PBOs. If precision bred organisms can move through parts of that chain without being identified, then the ability of organic producers to avoid them is compromised.

The case also needed a consumer voice, and that was provided by Joanna Blythman, whose long-standing commitment to food quality and transparency is well known.

As with all legal issues, there were fine lines to negotiate. Today’s organic standards, for which I can claim some credit, have always recognised that absolute purity can be difficult in a contaminated world. Spray drift, environmental contamination and other forms of unwanted intrusion have long been part of the reality organic farmers face. But that is precisely why a functioning regulatory system matters. If the Government creates a regime in which contamination becomes both inevitable and harder to identify and avoid, it cannot then pretend that organic producers and consumers are unaffected.

“Organic farming depends not only on what happens in the field, but on the reliability of the whole chain – seeds, feed, ingredients, certification, trust. Organic farmers are legally obliged to avoid all GMOs, including PBOs. If precision bred organisms can move through parts of that chain without being identified, then the ability of organic producers to avoid them is compromised.”

The Court’s verdict

I may not be a legal expert but I can read and the Court’s judgement makes very good reading.

It concludes that the Defra Farming Minister was repeatedly “misadvised” by his advisors that he had no power to mandate labelling and traceability for these new GMOs. It goes further, noting that had the Minister been given correct information he would have given greater consideration to the wider impacts of the regulations and indeed might have made different decisions about what they should contain.

The Court accepted that the consequences of removing the tools necessary to support traceability and transparency were real and likely to impose greater burdens – and costs – on famers, businesses and consumers.

It went further still, stating that organic farming is not merely a technical standard or certification scheme. For many, it represents a fundamental set of values, principles and professional commitments which the Regulations make much more difficult to maintain. To my knowledge, this is the first time something this impactful to organic has been made plain in a legal judgement.

More than a food issue

These are serious findings and, beyond their relevance to the food system, they reveal something very troubling about the way the government now works. If ministers are not properly informed, if MPs are not fully engaged and if complex regulations are waved through on the basis of ‘party lines’, industry lobbying and soothing language, then democratic oversight becomes little more than theatre.

Will the judgment make a difference? We shall see.

As I write, Beyond GM and its legal team are now in discussions with the Government about what should happen next. The Court has identified serious flaws in the way these regulations were developed and these cannot now be ignored.

The missing media

One thing is unfortunately clear. The media appetite for this issue is much less than it used to be. When the judgment was handed down, I rang my contacts at the BBC Radio 4 Today programme to let them know about a major breaking story. They said they were interested, but in the end came the familiar refrain: “Do keep in touch, we are interested in this, but unfortunately it didn’t make the cut for tomorrow’s programme.”

That would not have happened in the 1990s.

Today, the public, politicians and much of the media have allowed themselves to fall into a state of torpor about food and farming. The progressive industrialisation of our food systems has gone so far that many people have almost lost the will to complain. It is now difficult to buy genuinely high-quality, nutrient-dense, contaminant-free food.

What comes next?

I suspect this lapse of attention may be temporary. People such as Chris van Tulleken, who I recently interviewed for the Sustainable Food Trust podcast, have done a brilliant job alerting the public to the dangers of ultra-processed food. Many younger people, especially in Gen Z – if my sons are anything to go by – are increasingly worried about what is being done to the food they eat.

So, thank you Pat Thomas at Beyond GM and Lawrence Woodward, who provided strategic advice throughout, for your thorough and thoughtful work on this issue. Please do not give up – because this issue will not go away.

I may be just an ‘average person,’ albeit rather better informed than most because of a lifelong interest in this area, but I do not want to re-design nature. I do not want to eat food of poor nutritional quality. I do not want food contaminated by pesticide residues, GMOs, additives, preservatives or anything else I cannot identify or avoid.

Some people who shared these views were, perhaps understandably, reluctant to step forward and put themselves through the rigours of being a co-claimant. I chose to do so because I believe these regulations compromise my right, and the rights of others, to eat food that reflects our values and to grow it for others.

I am absolutely convinced I am not alone.

Write to your MP – you can be part of the action by writing to your MP. Use this link, expressing  your concerns and your support for transparency and labelling for PBOs. It’s quick, there’s suggested text to use and it does meaningful work in letting the Government know what the people really want.

Weight-loss drugs are reshaping how we think about appetite, health and what it means to eat well. These medications, often hailed as breakthroughs, are changing lives and offering new hope in the face of chronic disease. But as the focus shifts towards eating less, is a fundamental question being overlooked? Here, Dr Lucy Williamson — award-winning public health nutritionist, author and former vet — draws on 30 years’ experience across soil, livestock, food and human health to explore what’s being left out of the conversation.

The rapid rise of weight-loss drugs has sparked a global conversation about appetite, health and how we eat. For many, these medications are life-changing, supporting weight loss and improving metabolic health, in particular, type 2 diabetes and heart disease. Where other approaches have fallen short, they are offering new hope and the potential for longer, healthier lives. That matters.

Currently:

• The hidden cost of chronic disease in the UK attributable to the food system is £268 billion
• Ten percent of the NHS budget is spent on diabetes, the majority on type 2
• Over 50% of UK energy intake comes from ultra-processed foods (UPFs), rising to nearly 70% in 11-18-year-olds

But as this conversation gathers pace, it risks narrowing our focus. Much of the attention is on eating less – on appetite suppression, portion control and reduced intake. While this is part of the picture, it leaves a more fundamental question largely unasked: what is the quality of the food we are eating, and where does it come from?

At the centre of this discussion is GLP-1, a hormone naturally produced in the gut. It helps regulate appetite by slowing digestion, balancing blood sugar and signalling fullness. The latest medications work by mimicking or enhancing this process. But if the focus remains solely on suppressing appetite, without improving food quality, we risk overlooking the very systems that support health in the first place: our biology, our vital gut microbiome, our food and the soils that grow it.

Appetite, food and the gut

Appetite is not simply a matter of willpower, but a biological process shaped by signals between the gut, brain and metabolism, and influenced by our environment. At the heart of this system lies the gut microbiome, the vast community of microbes living in our large intestine; it supports our wider health, protecting it from immunity and inflammation, against allergy, overweight and obesity, cholesterol imbalance, cognitive decline and even cancer.

A healthy gut microbiome depends on a diverse diet rich in plant fibres and ‘bioactive’ compounds like antioxidants. UPFs in which nutrients have been displaced by high energy sugars and fats, reduce this diversity, weakening its protective role in overall health, including its influence on appetite. Food itself is more than nutrients – it should be a multi-sensory experience – a complex ‘matrix’ of structure and chemistry that determines how quickly its nutrients are absorbed, how full we feel and how long that fullness lasts. When this matrix is disrupted by processing or lower nutrient density, our biology no longer recognises this ‘food’ and our finely tuned appetite system just doesn’t work for us.

The gut microbiome and GLP-1

Our gut microbes are constantly producing probiotics for us – healthful compounds that work closely with our biology, for example stimulating cells in our gut wall to produce GLP-1, directly contributing to feelings of fullness. Prebiotics in our diet (types of fibre) further support this process by encouraging certain microbes to increase GLP-1 production. There is also emerging evidence linking our natural production of GLP-1 with higher levels of butyrate-producing gut microbes. Butyrate is our natural anti-inflammatory compound.

In this way, beneficial gut microbes help regulate appetite by enhancing GLP-1 signalling. In contrast, diets high in processed foods can reduce microbial diversity and weaken these mechanisms. Appetite, then, is not just about how much we eat, but what we eat, and how that food interacts with our internal ecosystem.

Inflammation: the root of chronic disease

Many of the chronic health conditions of our time – obesity and metabolic illness, allergies, cancers and digestive disorders, share a common root – inflammation. While inflammation is designed to be short-lived and protective, it is now often persistent. The gut microbiome is deeply involved in regulating this process.

The goal, therefore, is not simply to override appetite, but to restore the body’s natural ability to regulate it and in doing so protect our long-term health. To do that, we need to look beyond the plate.

Soil: where the story begins

To fully understand the connection between food and health, we must look to the soil in which our food is grown. The “soil to gut” connection is largely invisible, yet fundamental to the quality of our food and, ultimately, our health.

Healthy soil is a living ecosystem, rich in microbes, fungi and organic matter. These organisms support plant health and influence the nutrient content of crops and pastures being grazed for meat and milk. When soil is healthy, plants are more resilient and better nourished. In turn, foods grown in these systems can provide a richer array of nutrients and compounds that support our gut microbiome.

Antioxidants such as polyphenols and carotenoids, linked to reduced inflammation and improved heart and metabolic health, are often found in higher levels in crops grown in healthier soils. This emerging research shows a trend that organic produce often contains significantly higher levels of certain polyphenols, including flavanols and anthocyanins. Vitamins such as C, E and A are also often higher in food farmed in harmony with nature, reflecting the ability of microbe-rich soils to unlock nutrients for plants.

In contrast, the use of agrochemicals has been linked to poorer gut microbial health. Exposure to pesticides is linked with inflammatory changes in the small intestine, shifts in the gut microbiome and disruption to the gut’s mucous layer, an essential barrier that helps protect against inflammation.

It’s not only food that shapes our microbiome. Increasing evidence suggests our environment plays a role. Time spent in nature, such as gardens, green spaces or farmland, has been linked to greater microbial diversity. Contact with soil and plants exposes us to a wider range of microbes, helping to build a more resilient internal ecosystem. We don’t just eat to support our microbes; we live among them.

There’s still much to understand about these complex ecosystems, with soil health shaping the gut microbiome and, ultimately, human health, via food. Our microbiome is not separate from the wider ecosystem and in many ways, it is an extension of it.

Reconnecting the system

All of this brings us back to appetite and weight. Reducing overconsumption, particularly of ultra-processed foods, will undoubtedly benefit health. For some, weight-loss drugs are an important and necessary intervention.

But eating less of a poor-quality diet is not a long-term solution. If we focus only on suppression, reducing intake without improving food quality, we risk overlooking the systems that sustain our health.

The goal is not simply to control appetite, but to support it. That means looking beyond the individual to the wider system, from the food we eat to the soil it grows in.

Food produced from healthier soils, within farming systems that prioritise diversity and ecological balance, has the potential to better support the gut microbiome and the biological processes that regulate appetite and our metabolism. This is not a quick fix, but a shift in perspective.

It moves us away from seeing health as something to control, and towards understanding it as something to cultivate. Human health does not exist in isolation. It’s shaped by the health of our soils, our food systems and the environments we are part of.

If we want to improve public health, we need to look beyond the plate and reconnect the system from soil to gut.

Register to pre-order Lucy’s upcoming book, Soil to Gut: https://mailchi.mp/cfb2bb5b34ac/soiltogut

Connect with Lucy: https://lwnutrition.co.uk/

Food trends come and go, shaping what we eat and how we think about health. From plant-based to low-carb, with each new wave comes a surge of products designed to cash in. But behind the marketing, what does the evidence on health really say? And how do these trends relate to the realities of farming and food production? Joanna Blythman takes a closer look, through the lens of protein.

Suggest to the beefy blokes lifting weights in the gym that ‘high protein’ is merely the latest food-fad, and they’ll put you right. They have long seen a high protein diet as the only way to build muscle and need no persuading that a daily plate of steak and eggs could only be a good thing. But in recent years, high protein diets have crossed over from the sports nutrition domain to capture a much wider market, one with a more feminine demographic.

We were probably ready for that change of message. The ubiquitous ‘plant-based’ trend peaked in 2021 and has been losing ground ever since; UK plant-based food sales fell 4.5% in the year to January 2025.

Veganism, its most extreme incarnation, is right off the boil. An eating pattern that always appealed more to women than men, its Waterloo moment in the UK, came last year when the former head of communications at Veganuary quit her role to advocate a shift away from veganism to ‘less and better’ meat-eating. The proposition that populations would eventually transition to a diet free of animal-sourced foods proved to be a harder sell than its ardent proponents had hoped.

But another significant factor powering the taste for high protein is the arrival on the market of GLP-1 weight loss drugs, such as Ozempic, Wegovy and Mounjaro. Available from GPs, or unsupervised over the internet, these drugs suppress appetite and reduce overall calorie intake, but they also cause loss of lean muscle mass.

Nutrition advisers of a ‘Keto’ inclination have habitually stressed the value of protein-rich foods as a means to feel fuller longer. But now that so many people – once again, a majority of them women – use weight loss drugs, higher protein intake is advanced as the prescription for muscle repair during periods of rapid, drug-induced weight loss. “Muscle mummies”, who are full of the joys of a high protein diet combined with resistance training, attract more social media ‘likes’ than ‘cardio bunnies’ who remain loyal to Zumba and low-fat as the formula for weight control and health.

Perhaps it’s a reaction to the plant-based craze, but more people now seem to understand the fact that animal-sourced foods – meat, fish, dairy and eggs – are typically nutrient-dense, much higher in protein, weight for weight, than plant-sourced foods. Furthermore, it is gradually becoming more widely appreciated that the protein in meat, dairy, eggs and fish is more ‘complete’ in terms of providing the nine essential amino acids we need, in their most easily absorbable, digestible forms; the Sustainable Food Trust’s Grazing Livestock report has noted that, “…grass-fed meat and dairy tend to have superior nutritional profiles compared to their grain-fed equivalents”.

The Digestible Indispensable Amino Acid Score (DIAAS), endorsed by the FAO as the most accurate method of assessing protein quality, measures amino acid absorption in the small intestine. By this score, animal proteins (meat, egg, dairy, fish) score higher than plant proteins. On the DIAAS scale, beef and eggs, for instance, score 1.22 and 1.12 respectively, while kidney beans and oats score 0.61 and 0.44 respectively.

Soy is one of the highest-quality plant proteins, with a DIAAS score of 0.92, but consumer attitudes towards it are mixed, with taste preferences and perceptions varying widely across populations.

The role protein plays in supporting hormonal health, by regulating our appetite and stress hormones, has now emerged as a talking point. In women’s health circles, where the perimenopause and health in ageing are big issues, protein is commonly discussed as a strategy to combat muscle loss, stabilise metabolism, manage weight and maintain bone health, as oestrogen declines. The logic here is that women need to get less energy from carbohydrates and fats, and more from protein, to compensate for the biological changes that occur at menopause.

Over the years, government ‘healthy eating’ guidance has told us that overconsumption of fat is making us sick and obese. The low-carb lobby has argued back that carbohydrates, so rapidly digested as sugar, are the real culprit – not fat. Enter the ‘Protein Leverage Effect’ theory. It focuses on the satiating effect of protein and postulates the idea that without an adequate proportion of protein, the body’s drive to reach its target protein intake will make us continue to over-eat unnecessary energy from fats and carbs until we get the protein we need.

Heightened awareness of protein’s critical role in maintaining good health is, of course, good news for livestock farmers. UK meat sales saw a substantial upswing in 2025. We spent £500 million more on meat products.

Meat is off the naughty step, at last. The ‘yuk’ reaction towards meat has taken another knock from soaring interest in bone broth. Our grandmothers and great-grandmothers always had a stock pot of bones and carcasses bubbling away and saw that precious liquid as a foundation for good health. Bone broth contains collagen, which breaks down into gelatine during cooking, providing amino acids that are essential for joint health, gut lining integrity and connective tissue repair, along with useful micronutrients – magnesium, potassium and more – and fat-soluble vitamins from the bone marrow. As the currently strong growth in demand for ready-made bone broth products shows, previously squeamish meat avoiders can nevertheless be persuaded to purchase 500 ml of liquid bone broth at £7 a time, or keep powdered bone broth beside the kettle. Might concentrated powdered bone broth be the new Bovril?

But it is minimally processed dairy products, such as Skyr, that have benefited particularly handsomely from the protein quest. Witness the fortunes of cottage cheese. For decades, it looked like a legacy product from the 1960s, but now, powered by a TikTok buzz, cottage cheese is hot, hot, hot.

Grahams, the Scottish family, reported cottage cheese sales growth of 40%, just in 2024 alone. Propelled by the appetite for protein, its new Protein Cottage Cheese, with 25% more protein than standard cottage cheese, is flying off the shelves.

Manufacturers of ultra-processed foods are, naturally, only too glad to surf the protein wave. A ‘high protein’ label is the latest way to imbue products that least deserve it, with a halo of health. So, you can buy high protein everything, from crisps and energy bars, through meal replacement shakes and smoothies, to pizza dough and wraps.

A closer look at the composition of M&S’s High Protein Chocolate Porridge gives a flavour of the less processed products of this type.

It contains more than 21% sugar, which qualifies as high in sugar by even the most forgiving dietetic measure. It also contains chicory fibre (inulin). Fibre, in particular chicory fibre, is having a moment in some weight loss circles and is used in many ultra-processed food formulations, not exclusively high protein ones. But it can produce bloating, gas and other irritable bowel symptoms, particularly when taken in large doses in the form of supplements and powders.

Most high-protein supplements and snacks are based on concentrated ingredients, such as whey protein isolate, milk protein concentrate, pea protein isolates and soy fractions. Inclusion in a formulation of these hyper-processed substances allow manufacturers to keep the protein-seekers happy, but their creations lack the pleasing taste and texture of protein found in natural forms. Protein isolates can make products overly dry and chalky, with a challenging dense texture. Like soy, they often taste bitter. At this point, food technologists and product developers reach for emulsifiers, stabilisers, sweeteners and flavourings to make them palatable. Meanwhile the marketing departments are hard at work, positioning such novel creations as convenient tools for sating appetites and building muscle.

But there is no robust research on how these highly synthesised, industrial forms of protein might impact on human health in the long term. It’s more than likely that such new-fangled protein forms won’t be as well adapted to our body needs as protein in its more traditional forms.

So, should we be cynical about the high protein trend? It has to be said that our forebears were well aware that protein ‘keeps you going longer’, as they put it. The costliness of protein foods was the only reason they saw to restrict their consumption. But now over 50% of the food we eat in the UK is ultra-processed. If that mirrors your diet, watch out for any high protein sales pitch designed to convince you that the product you’re buying is great for you when, in fact, it is anything but.

Yet for people who cook for themselves routinely and actively avoid ultra-processed products, this current focus on protein is surely welcome. The prominence of protein in diet debates demonstrates that many more of us are now actively seeking out nutrient density, as opposed to counting carbs. That’s a welcome corrective to the stale plant-based, vegan fixation. Protein’s prominence puts animal-sourced foods back at the heart of our diets, which is where they always used to be.

To find out more about how we can produce nutrient-dense foods from sustainable livestock farming, read our report, Grazing Livestock: It’s not the cow but the how.

What’s really in our food these days and how might it be affecting our health? In this conversation on the Sustainable Food Trust podcast, Patrick Holden, founder and CEO of the SFT, and Stuart Oates, founder of the Fossil Free Farm project, discuss what chemical residues and ultra-processed foods might mean for our health, and consider possible solutions.

Patrick:
Let’s discuss the influence of what we eat on our health. I’ve recently come across a couple of reports: the first was a retraction by a well-known journal that published a report, I think about 15–20 years ago, saying Roundup was safe. Last week, they retracted it because they realised that a lot of Monsanto employees had intervened and influenced the research, making it unsound. I think that’s big because Monsanto, and more recently Bayer, have been relying on that report.

Roundup is widely used all over the UK and the world – on arable farms for weed control and as a pre-harvest desiccant, which is how it mainly gets into our food. Even if it breaks down quickly in the soil, it’s still on the crop at harvest. The first thing we should fix is that pre-harvest desiccant – that’s the biggest problem.

Stuart:
Yeah, you’re absolutely right. That pre-harvest desiccant is the biggest concern.

Patrick:
It ties into the broader conversation about chemicals in our food…and, as well as what’s applied to our food on the farm, there are also other kinds of chemicals in what we’re eating: the additives, the flavourings, all that stuff that’s put into food after it leaves the farm – particularly ultra-processed food.

There was a report in The Lancet recently looking at ultra-processed foods and other additives and the effect on the human microbiome. It sounds incredibly worrying. Basically, a lot of these additives are things our microbiome can’t cope with, and that’s almost certainly behind the exponential increase in previously uncommon diseases.

You have to ask why it is that one in two of us are now getting cancer. Surely that’s partly due to what we eat – and what we wouldn’t want to be in our food. I think The Lancet is drawing attention to that.

Stuart:
Yeah, absolutely. I think we’re only at the very beginning of that kind of research. For some reason, food has been completely unlinked from health for so long. I have lots of friends who are doctors, and not a single day of their course is spent on healthy eating and diet. That’s crazy.

That should be a big part of their training, because that’s preventative medicine – that’s what helps us live healthier lives along the way. Did you see the Panorama programme?

Patrick:
Yes.

Stuart:
That’s the next level. It’s looking at these forever chemicals.

Patrick:
That is quite scary.

Stuart:
Forever chemicals are going to be a big topic over the next decade. They’re only just being talked about in the mainstream, but they’ve been around for a very long time.

They’re deliberately designed not to break down. They have incredibly strong bonds, so they’re used for things like Teflon coatings on frying pans or waterproofing on jackets.

What shocked me in the Panorama programme was learning that there are forever chemicals in the sprays used on our food – pesticides and fungicides. They’re designed to stick to the surface of leaves and stay there. And that then gets into our food, our bloodstream, our bodies.

They’ve found forever chemicals in every single person they test. Every single one. You can’t understand how anyone thought that they were a good idea in the first place. Can you imagine, Patrick?

Patrick:
One chilling bit in that programme was when the presenter was offered a glass of red wine. Before asking if she wanted to drink it, the researcher explained that forever chemicals – which are active ingredients in pesticides – are sprayed onto grapes.

They explained that these chemicals are in the wine. Then they asked her if she still wanted to drink it. There was a grimace, and she said no. That was powerful.

I wonder whether red wine sales will drop this week – and whether organic red wine sales might rise. Because these issues really haven’t been brought to the public’s attention.

I don’t think the organic movement ever adequately described the extent to which unwanted chemicals get into our food and affect our health.

Stuart:
I think this is the big opportunity for organic. And we’re bound to say that, Patrick, as organic farmers and proponents of organic agriculture. But organic farming doesn’t allow forever chemicals – never has. That was part of the standards, even if we weren’t talking about forever chemicals when organic began.

If people really knew how their food was grown, things would change. I don’t want to attack other forms of agriculture – everyone is doing their best – but people need to know the truth so that standards and regulations can be higher.

In the UK, we’ll never compete globally on volume. But we could be the source of good, healthy, high-end food that’s environmentally responsible and careful about agricultural chemicals. We could be world leaders in that – if we choose to take the opportunity.

This extract is from an episode of the SFT podcast and has been lightly edited for readability. To hear the full conversation, click here. You can find all our episodes on the main podcast page.

Ultra-processed foods are everywhere – and now some of the world’s biggest food companies are being called to account. Victoria Halliday, the Sustainable Food Trust’s Communications Manager, looks at the evidence behind the health risks, cultural impacts and rising scrutiny of these products.

Recently, the city of San Francisco sued 10 leading food makers over their ultra-processed products. The accusation is that these companies are knowingly selling foods that have been linked to a rise in serious diseases, with comparisons being made to the tobacco industry. These ultra-processed foods (UPFs) make up an ever-increasing proportion of our diets – now accounting for over half of the food we’re eating in the UK and 60% in the US. Given that the latest research shows UPFs are associated with rising ill-health across the globe – from heart disease to depression – this raises urgent questions.

While our appetite for highly processed products is seemingly growing, it’s encouraging that the subject of better food and farming is breaking into both mainstream and fringe cultural discourse, from prime-time TV to post-punk poetry. Confrontational ‘no-wave’ poet and musician, Lydia Lunch (pictured), speaks of how heavily processed foods mean “we end up consuming so much poison”, while Happy Mondays’ lead singer, Bez, talks about replacing processed juices with fresh oranges, “preferably organic so there’s no pesticide sh*t in them”. And the issue is being covered through more mainstream channels too – from Joe Wicks’ Licensed to Kill on Channel 4, to Tim Spector’s popular science work on gut health and diet.

These voices can be incredibly powerful in helping to shape opinions and behaviours – most of us are much more likely to pay attention to a cultural figure whose work or opinions resonate with us, than to the earnest words of NGOs, politicians or policy experts. But whoever might be delivering the message, the facts on UPFs are becoming hard to ignore. As San Francisco’s case makes its way through the courts, it highlights three core claims that sit at the heart of the growing challenge to ultra-processed foods.

1. They’re engineered to be addictive

UPFs are designed to reel us in and keep us hooked. Food companies pour vast sums into engineering foods – or “food-like substances” as author Michael Pollan refers to them – that light up our brains’ reward centres due to their ‘hyper-palatability’. Combinations of high levels of sugar, salt and fat, as well as softer textures and artificially intense flavours, lead to cravings and a desire to eat more – so we end up eating too many calories but not enough nutrients.

The corporations behind these ‘foods’ are using increasingly aggressive tactics to drive consumption, influence research and prevent regulation. Although these companies put a lot of resources into advertising, seeking to persuade us that we have endless choice and novelty, the proliferation of UPFs means that we are, in fact, finding ourselves with fewer and fewer real options – just picture a supermarket shelf stocked with 20 different brands of ultra-processed, plastic-wrapped bread.

While addiction and craving are baked into the UPF business model, we’re encouraged to push blame onto each other (and ourselves) for not making better food choices as individuals. Our personal choices are powerful, and we can advocate for the type of food system we want by directing our spending accordingly – but the reality is that ultra-processed foods make up an ever-increasing proportion of what is available to buy in many supermarkets, especially in lower-income areas. The finger-pointing narrative serves as a smokescreen, diverting our frustration away from those making vast profits at the expense of public health and wellbeing.

2. They’re harming our bodies – and more

UPFs have been linked to harm in all our major body organs. The Lancet recently published major new research showing that the more UPFs we eat, the more likely that we will suffer from obesity, type 2 diabetes, hypertension, heart disease, Crohn’s disease, kidney disease, depression and many more conditions that result in ill-health and mortality. Professor Carlos Monteiro, one of the Lancet series authors, says this latest evidence “strongly suggests that humans are not biologically adapted to consume [UPFs]”.

Of key importance is the impact that UPFs have upon our gut microbiome – an intricate community of around 100 trillion microbes that live in our intestines. This microbiome is a major modifiable factor in our health and wellbeing, as explained by Tim Spector on the SFT Podcast: “A lot of the chemicals in your brain that transmit mood – and other states like fullness and hunger – are produced as chemicals, as your microbes digest plants. [These chemicals] go up into the bloodstream, into your brain, into the vagus nerve and can make the difference between you feeling happy or sad.” As well as mood, our gut microbiome influences many other aspects of health, including immunity, metabolic health and disease prevention.

While consumption of gut-damaging UPFs is on the up, the amount of fresh produce we consume is falling – a big problem for the health of our gut microbiome which depends upon a wide diversity of fresh foods. Fresh foods that have been grown in healthy soils and without agrichemicals provide us with unique fibres, polyphenols, and nutrients that feed different beneficial gut microbes. Which leads us to…

3. They’re crowding real foods off our plates

UPFs are pushing whole foods off our plates. This is a pattern being repeated across the globe – with the UK and US leading the charge. The impact on our health alone should be reason enough to resist this trend, yet the effects extend beyond this.

Food processing used to be mainly concerned with preservation of whole foods, as well as making them easier to use in the kitchen. Processing techniques varied from place to place – from fermenting cabbage to produce kimchi in Korea, to jellying eels in London’s East End. Now, industrial food processing is increasingly aimed at creating food-derived substances that take the place of whole foods entirely.

Long-established methods like freezing, drying, canning, pasteurisation and salting, largely preserve the natural composition of foods, whereas UPF technologies significantly alter them, mixing in industrial additives like plant protein isolates, mechanically separated meat, modified starches and oils, artificial colours, flavour enhancers, non-sugar sweeteners and emulsifiers.

As UPFs become ever more ubiquitous, they flatten regional food cultures, replacing distinctive local cuisines with the same globally standardised products. Food that once reflected place, season and tradition is reduced to a uniform commodity – weakening local food economies, eroding cooking skills and severing the connection between people and the land that feeds them.

Will 2026 dish up a moment of reckoning for UPFs?

So, as the evidence mounts against UPFs, what comes next? Putting limits on the influence and reach of UPF manufacturers through regulation and taxation is essential; the ban on pre-9pm junk food adverts, which came into effect this week, is a small but significant step forward.

The costs of the harm caused by these foods – or, at least, a significant proportion of those costs – needs to be borne by those who profit from them, not by the public, an approach that the SFT advocates through its True Cost Accounting work. We as citizens also need to be educated, encouraged and supported to make healthier food choices – and those healthy choices must become the easier, more affordable option.

While the outcome is yet to be decided, the San Francisco lawsuit marks a significant escalation in how local governments are challenging food industry practices on public health grounds and could be the beginning of serious change. With mounting evidence, stronger regulation and growing public awareness, UPF manufacturers may finally be facing a crunch point.

Interested to learn more about what’s in our food? We recommend this episode of the SFT Podcast where Patrick Holden and Stuart Oates discuss UPFs, chemicals in food and what we can do about it.

Image credits: Image 1 (Lydia Lunch): Creative Commons; Image 3 (serving food at market): Mike Swigunski

What’s in your food and how can you eat better? In this series, we look at some staple meals, considering what’s good for you and what’s maybe not – and how you can turn them into dishes that are healthier, better for the planet and alive with flavour.

Christmas Pudding is an enduring favourite for dessert at the end of the Christmas meal. But what it is today, is a long way from where it began, somewhere around the 14^th century. For starters, it included varied meats along with grains and it was cooked in a thickened broth called ‘frumenty’ which could include a range of ingredients, both savoury and sweet along with wine and spirits. It was traditionally aligned with reference to Christ and the twelve apostles, with thirteen ingredients in the recipe.

Through its history, it has evolved into a tastier and sweeter version, much thanks to the Victorians. The Nineteenth century cook Eliza Acton is credited with developing the first proper recipe for Christmas Pudding, appearing in her cookbook Modern Cookery for Private Families. Making your own Christmas Pudding isn’t as difficult as you might think, and it’s well worth having a go at it, because the ones bought in the supermarket are likely to have a number of not-so-good ingredients – almost all of the supermarket Christmas Puddings have palm oil and vegetable glycerol, along with emulsifiers such as E471 and E472e. And though organic versions are much better, you’d be surprised by what can slip in. In fact, many shop-bought puddings fall into the realm of ultra-processed food (UPF) – a category describing foods that are branded, commercial formulations made from cheap ingredients combined with additives, and mostly containing little to no whole foods. A recent study published in The Lancet reports that increased consumption of UPFs is driving multiple diet-related chronic diseases on a global scale.

There are myriad variant recipes for Christmas Pudding, but traditionally it started with mixed dried fruits and nuts playing an important role. Both are high in fibre and polyphenols, and they can sweeten food without the added sugar. They are also rich in antioxidants, and further, the spices in Christmas Pudding have both anti-inflammatory and anti-bacterial properties, so you can feel good about your dessert! Suet is used in most Christmas Puddings to meld the mixture together and it’s generally easy to get from a good butcher. For vegetarians it’s a little trickier as vegetable suet can contain highly processed ingredients – but opting for organic and avoiding formulations that contain hydrogenated vegetable oil can help to steer you towards healthier, more sustainable variants.

Recipes

Here are three home recipes to try this Christmas, each offering a slightly different take – from a tried-and-tested classic to a pudding that makes the most of in-season fruit.

1. This Christmas pudding recipe from BBC Good Food takes a classic approach
2. This steamed pudding uses quince as the fruit – currently in-season in the UK
3. This recipe from Doves Farm is a nice alternative to the traditional Christmas favourite

 

To read the other articles in our ‘Making More of Your Meal’ series, click here.

In July 2024, the Sustainable Food Trust (SFT) launched the Beacon Farms Network, bringing together sustainable and regenerative farms acting as educational platforms to inform and inspire young people and adults about the story behind their food.

At present, many of us are disconnected from where our food comes from and how it is produced. In response, the aim of the Beacon Farms Network is to harness the power of ‘seeing is believing’ experiences on farms and increase public understanding of the connections between farming, climate, nature and health with an emphasis on how food can be produced in harmony with nature.

One year on, the network has grown to over 40 farms across the UK, representing a diversity of farm types and locations, with farms hosting events for a wide range of audiences. A particular area of focus for the SFT this past year has been working with The Harmony Project to support farms in delivering school visits using our Beacon Farms resources. From April to October this year, 10 Beacon Farms have delivered 75 school visits for primary aged pupils, engaging more than 1,800 children, many of whom had never visited a farm before.

What’s in your food and how can you eat better? In this series, we look at some staple meals, considering what’s good for you and what’s maybe not – and how you can turn them into dishes that are healthier, better for the planet and alive with flavour.

Fish pie is one of life’s greatest comfort foods – the beautiful flaky pastry (or alternatively, yummy whipped potato topping), the creamy, tangy roux that envelopes the fish, the tasty additions you may love.

But sadly, many of the fish typically used in this dish are from populations on the verge of collapse. A recent report by Oceana UK on the state of UK fishing detailed the troubled waters: “over a quarter (27%) of the UK’s commercial fish populations are overfished to the point of having critically low population sizes, and 25% are being overexploited”. Many prized UK fish and crustaceans continue to be overfished, most notably North Sea cod and crab (in the Southern North Sea). And the most depressing thing about this, is that government bodies have done nothing over the years than to continue business as usual, allowing quotas to overreach scientific thresholds for the health of fish stocks, causing them to decline in peril.

So, what are the options here for that fish pie? Well, luckily there are some.

A good choice is Cornish, gillnet caught hake, which has been gradually replenishing since the early 2000s. In 2015, the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) certified the fishery as sustainable. Hake is a firm fish, much like cod but much more sustainable, and it’s ideal for fish pie. Also, look at other options such as Scottish haddock, coley and whiting to mix it up a bit. And keep in mind what often gets discarded – cod cheeks for example, which are a succulent overlooked bit of the fish.

A recent report by Oceana UK on the state of UK fishing detailed the troubled waters: “over a quarter (27%) of the UK’s commercial fish populations are overfished to the point of having critically low population sizes, and 25% are being overexploited”.

Sadly, for those who like prawns in their fish pie, they’re really not that sustainable anymore. The best shrimp option in the UK is brown shrimp, but these are caught in a bottom trawl (beam), which is a highly destructive form of fishing associated with a high amount of by-catch (unwanted species that are then discarded). The MSC give wild-caught brown shrimp from The Wash a ‘Best Choice’, but the damage done to the seafloor and the benthic organisms that live there remains problematic, while North Sea shrimp need improvement. Scallops are a delicious alternative for a real treat in your fish pie, but be prepared for the price of them.

Farmed salmon might seem like a good way of avoiding damage to wild stocks, but in reality is best avoided. As well as issues like mass mortality and sea lice, one of the many problems of fish farming is what the fish are fed. In the case of salmon, it takes more than a kilo of wild fish to produce a kilo of farmed salmon.

 

Delia Smith’s Flaky Fish Pie

You don’t have to do Delia’s recipe for fish pie, but it’s a hard one to beat and it’s easy.

This recipe is from The Delia Collection: Fish (serves 4)

Ingredients

For the pastry:

• 8 oz (225 g) plain flour
• 6 oz (175 g) butter
• a pinch of salt
• beaten egg, to glaze

For the filling:

• 12 oz (350 g) any white fish
• freshly milled black pepper
• about 12-15 fl oz (330-425 ml) milk
• 1 oz (25 g) butter
• 2 level tablespoons plain flour
• 1 level tablespoon capers, drained and chopped
• 4 small gherkins, drained and chopped
• 2 level tablespoons chopped parsley
• 2 hard-boiled eggs, chopped
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice

You will also need a baking sheet measuring 14 x 11 inches (35 x 28 cm), greased.

1. Chill the butter for the pastry (in foil) in the freezer for 30-45 minutes. Sift flour and salt and grate the cold butter into the flour, mix with a palette knife, sprinkle 2-3 tbsp of cold water, bring together and chill for 30 minutes.
2. For the filling: poach the fish in just enough milk to cover for 5-10 min, reserve the milk, flake the cooled fish (remove skin/bones) and set aside.
3. Melt butter in the same pan, stir in the flour, cook for 2 minutes, gradually add the reserved milk (300 ml), stirring constantly. Bring to the boil, simmer for 6 minutes, remove from heat and stir in the fish, capers, gherkins, parsley, chopped eggs, lemon juice and salt and pepper. Leave to cool until quite cold.
4. Pre-heat the oven to Gas Mark 7 / 220 °C (425 °F). Roll the pastry to 30 cm square; lift onto a greased baking sheet. Place the cold fish mixture in the centre. Brush the edge of the pastry with the beaten egg. Fold opposite corners to the centre, pinch the edges to make a cross shape and glaze the top and any pastry trimmings with the beaten egg. Bake for about 30 minutes, or until pastry is well risen and golden.

 

To read the other articles in our ‘Making More of Your Meal’ series, click here.

At the Sustainable Food Trust, we are always inspired by stories that show how farming can regenerate soils, strengthen communities and offer viable alternatives to industrial agriculture. Sri Lovely Organic Farm in Malaysia embodies these principles, demonstrating how sustainable approaches can transform abandoned land into thriving farming systems.

Sri Lovely Organic Farm was set up in 2009 by retired army major Zakariah Kamantasha – who goes primarily by the nickname ‘Captain’. Having been stationed in this remote jungle region during his military days, Captain saw the adverse effects that rural depopulation and increased reliance on conventional, chemical-heavy food production were having on local communities.

He wanted to help give young people, in particular, a reason to stay. Working with others and local authorities, he also wanted to help in addressing a local health crisis that was seeing rapidly increasing rates of diet-related illnesses (such as diabetes) and health conditions associated with exposure to chemical sprays (including cancer and lung disease).

The result, after months and years of working with local families and landowners to clear and consolidate a 10-hectare parcel of land that had been overtaken by the jungle, was the establishment of Sri Lovely Farm. A few years later, it became Malaysia’s first certified organic rice farm. And today, it has become an important education and knowledge-sharing centre, helping to encourage a new generation of Malaysian farmers wanting to create a more sustainable future.

Access to healthy, affordable food is one of the most pressing challenges facing our society today. At the Sustainable Food Trust, we believe that everyone should have the freedom and dignity to make positive food choices, yet millions are held back by a distorted pricing system that makes fresh, healthy foods more expensive than processed and ultra-processed options. Here, food policy expert, Honor May Eldridge, explores the history and politics of food vouchers, the growing potential of social prescribing, and the role farming can play in improving public health and wellbeing.

Fresh fruit and vegetables are not affordable for those who would most benefit from it. Healthy foods are nearly three times as expensive per calorie as less healthy foods. Often, processed foods are the most affordable and accessible foods for low-income communities to purchase while fresh produce is too expensive. In the Global North, healthy foods cost, on average, twice as much per 1000 calories than processed food. For many with limited resources to purchase food and other everyday items, price rapidly becomes the deciding factor and processed (and ultra-processed) foods are cheaper. According to an analysis by the Office for National Statistics’ Consumer Price Index, conducted by the University of Cambridge, the poorest fifth of UK households would need to spend 47% of their disposable income on food to meet the cost of the Government recommended ‘healthy diet’. For households with children in the poorest fifth of the population, 70% of their disposable income would be needed to achieve a healthy diet. This has significant knock-on impacts to public health, with healthy life expectancy in the most deprived tenth of the population, 20 years less for women and 18 years less for men, than in the least deprived tenth. It also has an economic impact since it leads to higher rates of sickness and inability to work, further compounding poverty.

Food vouchers as a tool for change

All citizens should have the freedom to choose what they want to eat and experience the dignity that comes with empowered food choices. There are two key approaches to making healthy food more affordable to low-income consumers. The first approach is food vouchers. Food vouchers have a long history as a policy tool to address hunger, malnutrition and food insecurity by giving targeted groups access to essential goods. Early versions appeared in wartime economies. For example, during the Second World War, ration coupons entitled households to limited amounts of butter, meat and sugar. Outside of wartime, voucher schemes evolved toward supporting vulnerable populations rather than managing scarcity. They became a common feature of welfare systems, used to provide nutritionally important foods like milk, bread or infant formula. In the UK, the Welfare Food Scheme (1940s–2006) provided subsidised milk and vitamins to pregnant women and young children. This was later replaced by the Healthy Start voucher programme that supports low-income pregnant women or families with children under four to purchase healthy foods, such as fresh, frozen and tinned fruit, vegetables and pulses, as well as milk and formula.

In the UK, one of the leading examples of food vouchers today is Rose Vouchers. Run by the Alexandra Rose Charity, it provides families with £4 per child (or £6 for children under one year old) each week, redeemable at local markets and greengrocers. This initiative operates in various locations, but in Tower Hamlets in London, they are committing additional resources to pilot how an increase to £8 per week with an additional £2 per household member, impacts the success of the scheme. Results after eight months showed that 90% of participants experienced improved physical health, GP visits were nearly halved and adherence to the ‘five-a-day’ guideline increased from below 30% to nearly 80%. Additionally, 75% of participants lost or maintained their weight, and over half reported improved mental health.

The politics of food vouchers

The history of food vouchers shows them as tools issued by the state or municipal government to low-income individuals, designed to alleviate poverty by tackling the hunger that stems from it. From their inception, they have been embedded in social welfare policy and are often associated with the political left, which tends to favour redistributive measures to support vulnerable populations.

Nowhere is this more visible than in the United States, which operates the world’s most prominent food voucher scheme. Food stamps were first introduced in the 1930s under Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal but in 1964, they became known as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), which has since become a cornerstone of US welfare policy. Yet, more recently, SNAP has also become a lightning rod for political debate: advocates on the left point to its proven role in reducing food insecurity, improving health outcomes and stimulating local economies, while critics – particularly on the right – frame it as an unsustainable government handout that fosters dependency. This tension highlights the way food vouchers have become contested symbols of the over-reach of social welfare programmes and the role of government in addressing poverty.

Social prescribing: food as medicine

Increasingly, the preferred model of making healthy food more affordable and accessible to low-income communities is through social prescribing. This positions food as medicine, as opposed to a social welfare concern – citizens access to healthy food as a healthcare-based intervention that recognises the link between diet and health outcomes. In this approach, medical professionals, GPs, community carers, midwives and other frontline staff, are able to distribute vouchers specifically for fresh fruit and vegetables to individuals whose poor health is linked to diet-related conditions. The prescription is based on medical need, as opposed to income. The idea is that, just as a doctor might prescribe medication, they can also prescribe access to nutritious food, helping patients take practical steps toward better health.

The framing of subsidising access to fresh produce as a medical intervention, rather than as a traditional social welfare programme, makes the idea of social prescribing more politically palatable. By locating the intervention within the healthcare system, it is presented not as a handout or redistribution of resources, but as a preventative health measure designed to reduce long-term costs to the state and improve public wellbeing. This reframing is important because welfare-based food vouchers often carry the weight of political baggage: they are associated with the legacy of social assistance, poverty relief and debates around dependency. Social prescribing, by contrast, situates the intervention in a clinical context, where doctors are empowered to act directly on the social determinants of health. The outcome, however, is broadly the same as voucher schemes: both models aim to increase access to healthy food among low-income groups, thereby reducing diet-related illness and inequality. Yet, because social prescribing lacks the long and often polarised history of food voucher programmes, it appears less ideologically charged. This makes it a more approachable option for policymakers across the political spectrum, including those on the right, who may resist welfare expansion but can support interventions framed as targeted, evidence-based healthcare solutions.

Green social prescribing and the role of farms

The SFT is taking this framing even further, acting as a catalyst to inspire change. Since 2022, the SFT, in partnership with the College of Medicine and the University of Bristol, have run a pilot project to connect GP practices with nearby working farms, inspired by the belief that engagement with nature and food production can support health and healing. Framed as ‘green social prescribing’, the project uses nature-based interventions, like gardening or farming, to improve wellbeing.

Now in its third year, the project continues to work with several farms in the Bristol and Gloucestershire area, with six-week programmes in the spring, summer and autumn aimed at local residents from urban and other more deprived areas. Activities typically include farm walks, interaction with animals, foraging, wildlife identification, harvesting and quiet reflection in nature. The results continue to be positive, with participants reporting better mental health, reduced isolation and high enjoyment, especially from animal contact.

The project highlights the potential of farm-based social prescribing to improve public health and wellbeing while supporting sustainable farming. Given the proven health gains and wider social value, the next step must be to expand this model across the country, ensuring that communities everywhere can benefit from the healing power of farming and nature.

To find out more about the SFT’s green social prescribing project, click here.