UK would run out of food today

I think the situation where countries are routinely importing goods from half way across the world is ridiculous. It's nice to have tropical fruit and vegetables but it makes more sense to live on what we can produce ourselves.

People in the developing world are often working for a pittance while the owners of the farms/orchards, etc., are making huge amounts of money with which they purchase luxury goods.

I learned when visiting Mauritius that foods that had formerly been available at a reasonable price to local people were now being exported because they yielded a much higher profit when sold overseas - and only the very rich people in Mauritius were able to afford them. This seems to be replicated throughout the world.

Yes, well, it's about meat, isn't it? Stop eating so much meat, stop feeding animals first, then eating them, and stop wasting so much food.

I agree Annaries but it's not just about meat. The people in some countries eat very little meat but they do need basic foodstuffs like rice, fruit and vegetables and if most of the product is being exported, that creates a shortage and higher prices at home.

I said it was about meat because the top link was from the meatsite.com from the NFU.
I think it would be difficult in this country to get the sort of diet that many of us eat. No mediterranean veg, for a start, no rice, coffee, tea, etc.
In countries where most of the produce is being exported, it's not because they have surplus food. It's usually places where the farming population do not have enough to eat because international conglomerates own the rights to the food. That cannot be right.

It would help if people grew their own more. Most gardens, however small, used to have a vegetable patch, but not many do now. It is far easier now to get compact greenhouses, raised beds and structures for growing fruit that will fit in really small spaces. You can certainly grow your own mediterranean veg in the UK (our aubergines used to do better in Sheffield than they do here in Northern France). Put pressure on councils to keep allotments open and campaign for new ones.
I was reading a thread on a forum the other day when people were asking what exercise equipment they could install and use in their garden. Why on earth would you not use the space to grow food and get the exercise at the same time?

Mamie I agree with you 100%. And further, my husband took up gardening whilst recovering from a heart attack and because we didn't have the space for a veg garden, he simply started guerrilla gardening outside our front gate and expanded his garden over time.

This year we have successful crops of potatoes, tomatoes, onions, beans, beetroot, aubergine and carrots. No wonder he won an award a couple of weeks ago .

On another note, when I do use a pack of supermarket veg that I gave bought "2 for £3" and it comes from, say Kenya, I find myself thinking of the person who picked those to support their family.

We are extremely spoilt in the UK.

...'have' bought, not 'gave'.

That is brilliant news about the award.
I agree about the dilemma of the vegetables from Africa. I really don't know what the answer is to that. Here in France our range of vegetables is far more limited and local. Our neighbours still sell really shrivelled apples from the previous autumn on their market stalls right through the spring.
When you think how people managed to grow so much during the war it seems a terrible shame not to do it now. I know the demand for allotments is still high in the UK though.

I think people have become very lazy. It's too convenient to buy veg from the supermarket and growing your own can be expensive and time consuming.

I'm trying to encourage DD and her boys to take an interest in growing veg but no luck so far. When they moved here I had visions of growing for the five of us with everyone tucking into healthy meals. Sunday lunch is often a winner but I wonder what they live on the rest of the week!!

Young people have got to rise to the challenge if we're going to produce more of our own food. It's hard, physical work and then there's the marketing. With the best will in the world I could not manage a stall at a farmers market.

Good post, Mamie.

We could also stop the destruction of perfectly edible, tasty fruit and vegetables which are not 'pretty' or 'perfect' enough to grace our supermarket shelves. A disgraceful waste of tons of good food. Apparently in France the supermarkets sell this at a reduced price, and I believe Waitrose is trying to do this (although I have seen no evidence of this in our local store). This would also encourage families to buy healthy produce which they claim they cannot afford at present.

I was not thinking of what we should or should not be eating (eg the less meat agenda), more that we should be encouraging and helping our own farmers to produce more food in this country for home consumption rather than having what I believe is about 40% brought from elsewhere.

I do think we pay a ridiculously low price for milk in this country - before anyone protests and says that poor families can't afford to pay more then I would say I am not suggesting doubling the price, just a few pence more per pint to give the dairy farmers a reasonable income.

I recall last winter and the attitude of some in the media, people I spoke to and I believe the agenda of the EA over years who were of the opinion that the Somerset levels should be left to disappear and that it was more important to save areas like the Thames Valley ( which of course must be saved!). But what many people fail to grasp is that the Somerset Levels is a food producing area - food does not appear on supermarket shelves by magic. It takes enterprise, expertise and sheer hard work and we should be supporting farmers. We should be encouraging the next generation who may be thinking that farming as a career is like being on a hiding to nothing. Many of our County farms which would give young people a start in agriculture are disappearing.

The population is growing and so should our farming industry to keep pace.

I agree that we should be encouraging and supporting farmers. We are surrounded by small dairy farms and the price they get for milk is ridiculously low. They went on strike a couple of years ago and people supported them by boycotting the dairy shelves. Some supermarkets agreed (not sure how that worked) and gave stuff away for free.
I have never seen discounted misshapen veg in our bit of France though. Our supermarkets sell grotty old wrinkled and mouldy veg at full price, so you have to pick it over. Another incentive to grow you own!
Veg growing can be a bit expensive at first but we save seed and share seedlings in our village.
I don't understand why anyone buys bags of salad in summer when a few plants of cut and come again salad leaves in a grow bag are so easy. My DD works full time and has a tiny garden, but they grow lettuce, tomatoes, cucumber and early potatoes in containers.
In my experience allotments were always full of wiry folk in their eighties enjoying their gardening. Got to be cheaper and healthier than a gym membership!

We have grown more this year and seem to have better crops. (Courgettes, anyone?)
It would not be enough to keep us going through the winter though, apart from the soft fruits.

I think we do take our food ver much for granted; the sheer volume on our supermarket shelves is astounding, and we have become accustomed to have vegetables and fruit 'out of season' because they have travelled thousands of miles to reach us.

I remember going to one European country years ago where food was quite scarce; if you did not buy food for lunch first thing in the morning there was nothing much left in the local shop by 11 am but, there were roadside stalls selling delicious local fruit.

Courgette glut here too! Even with 30 raised beds and winter crops we are not completely self-sufficient. We make a lot of soups and vegetable dishes like curry, ratatouille and minestrone, but we run out of spuds after Christmas and we buy avocados, apples, oranges, tomatoes and frozen peas in winter. The thing is though, that if everyone grows what they can, it will make a difference. Everybody can do something.
We have to stop frivolously wasting the world's resources.

I have three freezers full of home grown food and finished last year's fruit and veg just as the first of this year's produce came through. Green beans, mange tout, cabbage, leeks, beetroot, turnips, onions, garlic and potatoes are all able to keep well. Tomatoes and courgettes, though more seasonal, are chopped up and frozen to add to soups and casseroles.
I buy very little food at the supermarkets. At the moment I have a real glut of (delicious) cucumbers and I literally can't give them away. I've had them on a table at my front gate with a sign saying 'free cucumber - help yourself', but so far only about twelve have been taken.

Too far for me to come for a cucumber, granny - ours did not even germinate this year although we usually have some.
I have made cucumber soup in the past, nicer than it sounds and nice chilled!

Lots of Gnetters producing their own food by the sounds of it which is wonderful.

However, judging by the lack of 'swaps' where we live I think that fewer of our neighbours are growing anything edible.

How do you store your potatoes grannyactivist? We keep ours in proper potato sacks in a cool, dry room, but they still start to sprout after six months. Obviously we freeze them in curries, soups and so, but haven't managed to keep them in a raw state for a year.
Am impressed that you manage to finish all last year's frozen food. OH took the umpteenth load of beans down the other day and then found some of last years at the bottom of the freezer. More curry...
OH strings and hangs the garlic, shallots and onions (thank heavens for YouTube) and we also dry quite a lot of beans like borlotti.

We grow a lot of our own fruit and veg. too, but find it involves a lot of physical work which we are increasingly less able to do. And I think perhaps we get more plant pests and diseases here (SW France) than in the UK. eg last year hundreds of colorado beetles, only 2 this year, plus wireworm infestation.
We have potatoes, and tomatoes, which I've just discovered have been attacked by mildew. it's been very warm and damp here recently.
So we should really dig them all up, but it's so hot out there!
On the other hand, homegrown veg. have so much more flavour, and no insecticides or herbicides.
Our favourites and most successful are onions, various kinds.

Do you all grow your own meat and fish as well? The link was about meat.

I don't think the link is just about meat. There is a link to the meat site, but everything I read here and have read elsewhere is about all kinds of food.
My nearest neighbours live a subsistence existence which includes nettles and dandelion leaves, they keep chickens and have rabbits. The chickens are used for eggs until they are too old, then boiled for the pot. Many people here hunt and river fish in season. They drink cider and calvados. This is the way they have lived since the revolution (and before without the hunting). They are living off the land and their use of the world's resources is pretty minimal. I would never be sentimental about their life it because it is hard, but I am full of admiration for them and it has made me think very hard about how much we consume.

But you are in France, Mamie, and have a much greater mix of vegetables to grow than in Britain.
It is about meat, because if we buy and eat less meat, the farmers will put more land to producing vegetables, so we will be self-sufficient for longer. Farmers do not want us to grow our own, they want us to buy what they have grown. This is self-sufficiency on a national not individual scale.

By the way, I looked up vegetarian on the NFU website. It got two mentions. One was to tell vegetarians not to apply.

Not all farming land is suited to growing vegetables though. I have family who are sheep farmers in mid-Wales. They grow a few vegetables for themselves, but they couldn't make a living. Without the sheep the uplands would quickly be overgrown and the area would lose the population to the towns.
I loathe factory farms with a passion and am not keen on huge vegetable and arable farms that grub up hedgerows and use chemicals to enhance the crop either.
Grow your own, support local producers, grow and eat organic where you can. I don't think the problem is with the farmers really. It is the power of the supermarkets, the hideous "food industry" and the insatiable demand for cheap food.
Small is beautiful.

Good point Annaries. We have chickens too and eat them and their eggs. But I accept we are privileged here to have the space to do that, and to be able to be partially self sufficient. We eat beef and lamb only about 10 times a year, and I can't say enjoy the beef - the lamb - yum!
The UK has only limited space, and a population which has a big demand for pig and cow meat, which isn't really an essential part of the human diet.
All I can think of is a massive educational programme to wean people off this type of food.

I eat organic food.
Nowadays farmers are paid to put hedgerows back in for the diversity of wildlife. The problem is with both the farmers and the supermarkets. Because of its financial problems, the Co-op has just had to sell off its farms, which is a shame.
Are you a contributor to Practical Action as well, Mamie?