UK Food Supply at Risk as Prolonged Drought Hits England and Wales, NFU Warns

Britain faces a potential food supply crisis as an unprecedented summer drought continues to ravage agricultural output, the National Farmers' Union (NFU) warned on Sunday. NFU president Tom Bradshaw said the situation is critical: wheat and oat yields are "very, very poor", and livestock farmers are being forced to use winter feed reserves because drought has stopped grass from growing.

Drought has been formally declared across large parts of England and the whole of Wales. More than 20 million people are under hosepipe bans imposed by water companies struggling to maintain supplies in the relentless heat. Amber heat-health alerts remain in force for the Midlands, south-east and south-west of England until Wednesday.

England recorded just 5.6mm of rainfall up to 30 July -- only 8% of its long-term July average and less than half the previous record low of 13.4mm set in 1911. Wales similarly recorded 7.9mm, also 8% of its monthly average.

Vegetable producers are critically short of irrigation water, reducing the volume of produce available and raising the cost of growing it. "We have to recognise that water security is a critical part of our food security and food security is our national security," Bradshaw told the BBC.

He called on Prime Minister Andy Burnham to invest more in reservoir infrastructure, arguing that vast volumes of winter rainwater that could be captured are instead pumped out to the North Sea. He also proposed tax breaks for farmers who build on-farm water storage systems.

"We can't change what's happening at the moment, there is no water in our rivers, but we must use this to take action for the future," Bradshaw said. He warned that complacency about domestic food production is dangerous: "Those other countries around the world that we currently rely on to produce our food and vegetables, their climates are changing as well."

Scientists note that while droughts are natural events, climate change makes weather patterns more erratic, increasing the frequency and severity of prolonged dry spells. The combination of successive heatwaves and abnormally low rainfall has rapidly depleted soil moisture, vegetation reserves and river levels across the UK.

Bradshaw concluded with an urgent appeal: "We have taken our food supply for granted for far too long. It does feel like there is going to be some shortages of products." He urged the government to draw "a line in the sand" and commit to prioritising domestic agricultural production as a pillar of national economic growth.