Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what progress he has made on recruiting agricultural representatives in key global export markets to facilitate the access to those markets for UK food and drink producers; and what resources will be available to those representatives to develop that export initiative.

In November, the Government announced a substantial increase to our international agri-food capability, through the recruitment of eight new agriculture, food and drink attachés.

Since then Defra officials have worked with colleagues across Government and the international network to design this expanded agri-food attaché network, and determine the most impactful locations and portfolios for these roles. We will launch the recruitment of these new roles imminently, and aim to appoint and induct the new agri-food attachés rapidly in the coming months.

The agri-food attachés themselves represent a significant commitment from the Government to increase our agri-food export capability. To support this expanded international network, we are laying the groundwork to ensure the agri-food attachés are well connected to all relevant Government stakeholders and policy levers, ensuring that the additional capability that they bring is as impactful as possible for all parts of the UK.

This will build on the successful work of our existing Agriculture Counsellor roles in China and the Gulf. For example, the Agriculture Counsellor in China was pivotal to securing lucrative market access for pork, and protecting agri-food exports when new import conditions were applied last year.