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

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what recent assessment he has made of the future prospects for farmlands and the pressures posed by a growing population and increased use of energy crops.

Crops can be a useful source of energy but we need to balance the need for new forms of energy with the need to grow crops for food, and we are working with other government departments to make sure we get this balance right. The Government's bioenergy strategy makes clear that food production must remain the primary goal of agriculture and bioenergy must not undermine food security in the UK or internationally.

Defra is commissioning a collaborative project with the Energy Technology Institute to examine data from 32 existing bioenergy production businesses in England and Wales on food production and environmental sustainability. The project will deliver a set of indicators to help identify the types of bioenergy that can complement food production and those that present risk. Where there is risk to food production the project will consider mitigation measures and issues will be drawn out through case studies.

In 2011 Defra and the Department for International Development co-sponsored the Government Office for Science's Foresight report which explores the increasing pressures on the global food system between now and 2050 and asks how a future global population of nine billion people can all be fed healthily and sustainably. The Report highlights the decisions that policy makers need to take today, and in the years ahead, to ensure that a global population can be fed sustainably and equitably. Defra has embedded the importance of food security across the Department's policies, recognising the many areas of policy that impact on food security outcomes, and we continue to invest significantly in research in this area.