Britain has suffered the second-worst harvest on official record as a result of a cold, wet and miserable summer.
Unfathomable analysis shows that wheat harvests are down 21 million tons, or 21%, compared to last year, while barley is down 26% and rapeseed is down 32%. Energy and Climate Information Department.
Listen to this story on James Meadway’s podcast. large capacity.
Hardest hit has been Britain’s booming wine industry, with grape harvests down to two-thirds to three-quarters of last year’s, depending on the region.
unpredictability
This was more than just bad weather. Attribution studies is a new field of research that uses scientific modeling to say much more precisely whether and to what extent some specific weather events are due to climate change.
During 2023 and 2024, British scientists world weather contribution It is estimated that climate change is causing storm rainfall to be 20% more severe, and total rainfall is expected to be four times greater due to climate change. So we can say with a high degree of certainty that Britain’s dismal summer of 2024 was due not just to bad luck but to climate change.
These poor harvests have real consequences. The first to be affected are farmers. The ECIU estimates that agricultural income across the UK will be reduced by £600 million due to lower yields in just the five crops they looked at.
With many small farmers already in crisis as they face rising costs and unpredictability, this could be enough to push them into bankruptcy.
consumed
A third of UK farms will be unprofitable by 2022 and there has been a surge in agricultural bankruptcies over the past few years. Support for basic income for farmers is growing. BI4 Farmers A campaign that started in April.
This will ensure farmers’ income levels and allow them to continue operating and mitigate the increasingly dramatic fluctuations in farm income.
This is important because on the other side of the deal, we all need food to eat. And this is where the UK’s food system model is coming under increasing pressure.
For decades, the country has relied on imports to meet its food needs, with the total amount of food consumed here falling from about 80% in the early 1980s to 60% by 2023.
drought
There was a firm argument for importing food from elsewhere. The variety of foods we eat has expanded dramatically, with once exotic luxuries like olive oil moving into necessities. Retail sales of olive oil have surpassed all other cooking oils. 2004.
