Disastrous fruit and vegetable crops must be ‘wake-up call’ for UK, say farmers
[...]The country suffered the wettest 18 months across the 2023-24 growing year, leaving soil waterlogged and some farms . The impact on harvests has been disastrous. Data from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs shows that year-on-year vegetable yields decreased by 4.9% to 2.2m tonnes in 2023, and the production volumes of fruit decreased by 12% to 585,000 tonnes.
Scientists say that climate breakdown caused by the burning of fossil fuels is likely to bring more to the UK, including more frequent .
Farmers said they were not able to plant due to the wet weather, and this is borne out in the statistics. The growing area of vegetables was down, falling by 6.5% to 101,000 hectares. A dry early summer in 2023 also did not help, as those who could not irrigate found it hard to plant.
Wet weather in the autumn and winter meant that the planted area of brassicas decreased by 3.1% to 23,000 hectares, leading to a 0.4% fall in broccoli yields and a 9.2% year-on-year fall in cauliflower volumes. Onions fared similarly, with volumes down by 13% and a fall in production area of 3.6%. So did carrots; their yields fell by 7.2%.
Farmers said the next government needed a proper plan for food security as the UK’s climate becomes less predictable, with more extreme weather hitting farms.
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