HALIFAX – Two years ago in the midst of a world hunger and food price crisis, world leaders met in Rome to pledge more attention and investment in agriculture.
The message targeted developing world governments that ignored agriculture as an old-fashioned industry in hopes that investment in more modern enterprises would develop.
The result was falling food production, rising prices, growing hunger and government panic.
As Nick von Westenholz sees it, the message also resonated in the United Kingdom where agriculture had been in decline and disrepute.
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The world food crisis was one of the factors that suddenly made the government recognize the importance of domestic food production, the government affairs advisor to the British National Farmers’ Union said July 14.
“The food price crisis of 2008 and the civil unrest it caused in a number of countries was a wake-up call in Great Britain and helped change attitudes,” he told the annual general meeting of Dairy Farmers of Canada by video link from Britain.
Part of the result was a proposal from the previous Labour government to have a Food 2030 strategy to develop a strong and profitable farm sector.
It is based on providing locally grown healthy foods, building a sustainable food sector that is environmentally responsible and embracing new technology.
Von Westenholz said the British farm sector has endorsed the vision although it is vague and there is some doubt if the recently elected Conservative government will implement an agricultural vision developed by the previous Labour government.
As in Canada, the British Conservatives hold most of the rural seats.
“We have bought into this but at this point, there is a vision but not much has been delivered,” he told the DFC convention.
A series of catastrophes from BSE, the human version of it and foot-and-mouth disease led to a crisis of confidence among consumers about the safety of British food almost a decade ago, he said.
At the same time, the national government had decided that domestic food production was not essential. And European Union subsidies that led to expensive overproduction did not help.
“All of this produced a level of cynicism and a lack of trust in agriculture,” said von Westenholz.
The agriculture department was abolished and rolled into an environment and rural affairs portfolio where the emphasis was on environment.
Now, the Food 2030 strategy report says the goal is to have as much food produced in Great Britain as possible as long as it is needed and produced in a sustainable way.
But despite the fact that a Conservative- led coalition has taken power by holding most of the rural seats, it is committed to deep budget cuts and that may affect how much is available to invest in agriculture.
“Still, having a government document support the idea of producing as much food as possible here is a tremendous step forward,” he said.
