Defra publishes its UK Food Report for 2024

The UK Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) has just published its UK Food Security Report 2024.

The report sets out an analysis of statistical data relating to food security, examining past, current, and future trends relevant to food security, to present the best available understanding of it at the time of publication.

Its five main themes are global food availability, UK food supply sources, food supply chain resilience, household food security and consumer confidence/food safety.

It comes as the UK’s overall balance of trade and production is broadly stable. Extreme weather events continue to have a significant effect on domestic production, and the UK continues to be highly dependent on imports to meet consumer demand for fruit, vegetables and seafood.

Any long term decline in the UK’s natural capital is a pressing risk to UK food production. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine also caused a spike in input costs such as energy and fertiliser.

The report also notes that while a large majority of households in the UK continue to be food secure, there has been a notable decrease in such households. There has been a notable rise in inflation too - both overall and for the category of food and non-alcoholic beverages since the beginning of 2021.

Most people don’t meet government dietary recommendations, with those from lower-income groups less likely to meet recommendations than those from the highest-income groups. Rates of food insecurity vary greatly by demographics, with a notable difference in levels and experiences between income groups.

Finally, it notes that the results of UK consumer surveys indicate the levels of trust in Food Standards Agency FSA and Food Standards Scotland (FSS) have remained relatively high. There has been an increase in consumers reporting concerns about food prices since 2021.

You can read the report in full here.