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

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps his Department is taking to prevent potential food shortages.

As demonstrated throughout the Covid-19 response, the UK has a highly resilient food supply chain. Our high degree of food security is built on supply from diverse sources, strong domestic production, as well as imports through stable trade routes.

The Government will shortly be publishing a food strategy. This will address food security, and the importance of international resilience and open markets, but also the importance of domestic production and how that contributes to our resilience.  It will also address the role of the food industry in our levelling up agenda.

In England, our new farming schemes are supporting farmers to improve profitability and productivity.

We have increased the Farming Investment Fund for small technology grants from £17 million to more than £48 million, supporting thousands of farmers with their investment plans this year.

Food production and environmental protection must go hand in hand. For the first time we will be safeguarding the assets that support domestic food production, by taking the health of our soils as seriously as the size of our yields.

Food security rests not just on maximising domestic production (which is market driven), but on making best use of land types and good farming practices. Our schemes will ensure our long-term food security by investing in the foundations of food production: healthy soil, water, and biodiverse ecosystems.

Finally, the Government has also set out a legal obligation to produce an assessment of our food security at least once every three years. The first UK Food Security Report was published in December 2021. It recognised the contribution made by British farmers to our resilience, and the importance of strong domestic production to our food security. This report serves as an evidence base for policy work, safeguarding food security in the UK for years to come.