Shadow agriculture minister warns of legislative disaster

Over-regulation is threatening the very survival of the UK’s food and drink industry, Conservative shadow agriculture minister Jim Paice warned Food Manufacture​ last week.

Paice spoke of the burden of various legislation faced by the sector and described plans to dramatically restrict the use of pesticides​ as both “frightening” and “absurd”. The proposed new rules “could potentially devastate the UK’s food supply”, said Paice. “The future of British food manufacturing is at stake, and the cost of ingredients will skyrocket.”The British government is not doing enough to ensure that the pesticides proposals would not become law, he said, “which will mean that up to 85% of agricultural pesticides could be banned and growing produce like salads and potatoes will become impossible”

According to Paice, the consequence is likely to be that food manufacturers have to import vast quantities of ingredients and raw materials from outside the EU at a time when global demand for food was likely to increase dramatically. “With the [global] population predicted to grow nearly 50% to 9bn by 2050, the competition for raw materials will really heat up,” he warned.

Demand for protein and grain for animal feed from China and India, in particular, were predicted to rise sharply as their economies developed and this would put more pressure on world supplies, he said.

In a further swipe at the “legislative burden” unfairly imposed on the food sector, Paice cited the example of the Seasonal Agricultural Workers Scheme (SAWS). “The National Farmers’ Union have estimated that around £40M worth of crops were left rotting in the fields this year due to insufficient labour,” he claimed. “It’s unfathomable, people in this country simply just don’t want to do this kind of work.”

SAWS grants seasonal work permits to non-EU citizens to help British growers during harvest. In 2004, the government reduced the quota from 25,000 to 16,250 and workers from new EU accession countries, such as Poland and the Czech Republic, filled the labour gap. This year, the SAWS quota was only available to workers in the new accession EU States Bulgaria and Romania.

“Such legislation undermines the UK’s supply of raw materials and ingredients,” added Paice. “So the government must do more to help manufacturers and growers.”