The first UK-wide review of farm assurance runs close to 200 pages and delivers a detailed assessment of the state of farm assurance schemes in the UK.
There is a lot to digest, but the overarching conclusion is that farm assurance, across the 12 schemes covered, is not delivering on its remit and ‘fundamental changes’ are needed to address growing frustration among farmers about how it is delivered.
The review was established by the UK farming unions and AHDB last year in the wake of the widespread anger over Red Tractor’s attempt to introduce a Greener Farms Commitment (GFC).
Conducted independently by four commissioners – lead commissioner Dr David Llewellyn, the former Harper Adams University vice-chancellor; Mark Suthern; Katrina Williams; and James Withers – the nine-month review collected evidence from across the UK food supply chain.
The question for all involved now – the schemes, their users and representative bodies and, in some cases, government – is whether the report’s far-reaching recommendations can be turned into meaningful change.
What is farm assurance for?
The review report grappled with the difficult question of the purpose of farm assurance and who it is for, highlighting ‘diametrically opposed’ views on it in different parts of the supply chain.
“The lack of agreement on what farm assurance really stands for goes right to the heart of the challenges faced by the system in the UK,” the report observed.
For retailers, it is often seen as a ‘necessary cost of doing business’, and a means of finding out about the safety and other attributes of the products they source.
For farmers, the view is much more mixed. A high percentage believes farm assurance may not even be necessary, with many seeing its standards as ‘a means of control by the rest of the supply chain to undertake tasks which they often see as overly onerous and lacking in value’.
However, a similar percentage see the standards in a ‘more constructive manner’ – for example, as a way of obtaining a premium price for their products.
In an online survey, more than 50% of pig farmers agreed that farm assurance is an ‘essential requirement’ in UK farming, making it more supportive than all other sectors, bar horticulture (66%). Across all sectors, 42% agreed that farm assurance was essential, versus 45% who said it was not.
However, the review concluded, based on the evidence gathered, that the farm assurance system should be ‘retained, but improved’.
“Without a robust farm assurance system, there is a risk of damage to retailer and consumer confidence, and a prospect of further fragmentation in the determination of standards in UK farm products,” it said.
Recommendations
The review made nine strategic recommendations:
On-farm audits must be reduced, simplified and delivered more consistently
The biggest complaint from pig farmers about farm assurance is the inspection burden, particularly where RSPCA Assured and retailers are involved, as well as Red Tractor.
The report calls for additional cooperation between schemes to allow for multiple audits to be conducted at the same time, reducing duplication, and encourages ‘earned recognition’ between schemes, with reduced inspections for consistently compliant businesses.
Schemes are requested to adopt a risk-based approach to audit visits within six months, with a reduction in audit frequency for consistently compliant businesses within two years.
They are also urged to, within six months, ‘undertake a deep dive of existing standards to provide a publicly available plan setting out which will be removed, replaced or improved’.
A transformational step forward in embracing technology and managing data
This includes more use of remote assessments to reduce the ‘make-or-break nature of a periodic inspection’, helping to move to a culture where assurance is a ‘365-day-a-year rolling activity’ and assessments become ‘spot checks’ on that activity. This would also help reduce the impact of inspections on farmers’ mental health, the report noted.
Assurance schemes, working together, are urged to look into establishing a data co-op to share data across the private and public sector.
Farm assurance schemes need to reset and/or restate their decision-making structures to establish farmers as the driving voice in standards development
In some schemes, the report noted, there is an imbalance of power between the farming community and others involved in setting the standards – concerns pig farmers have voiced in the past.
“This needs to be addressed to improve the level of trust between these schemes and the farming community,” the report said.
Among the means of achieving this, it called for more transparency in appointments to sector boards.
An industry-led initiative must set out the future environmental ambitions for farm assurance, establishing this as an area of competitive advantage for UK farming
Addressing the aftermath of the GFC controversy, the report said there is ‘no escaping the fact that environmental standards in farming need to be improved and that farm assurance will need to take account of these developments, sooner rather than later’.
It stressed that farmers must be compensated for additional environmental work where environmental standards are ‘driven by other actors in the food chain to satisfy their public reporting requirements’.
With Red Tractor dropping its plans for a GFC and other schemes progressing their own initiatives, the report warned ‘there is no firm leadership around the issue of establishing a consistent framework for environmental standards’.
“This issue must, therefore, be taken out of the hands of the farm assurance system and addressed by farming representatives, working with the relevant regulators,” it said.
Red Tractor (RT) must complete the implementation of recommendations in last year’s Campbell Tickell report
The report observes that a ‘significant proportion of farmers and growers have lost confidence in the operations of RT’ and too many farmers feel the scheme is not ‘owned by them’, but rather ‘done to them’.
“While tensions arose publicly in relation to the GFC, our view is that this merely acted as the catalyst for issues to come to the surface,” it said.
However, it stressed that there is also ‘strong support for the scheme from many, notably in the pig sector’, and many farmers want it to be successful.
Nonetheless, it warns that, unless action is taken quickly to rebuild bridges with key sectors, the scheme faces an ‘existential threat’.
“Central to strengthening RT will be a board and senior executive team that recognise the scale of concern that exists and the urgency of action. We are concerned that is not the case,” the report stated.
The report described RT as ‘somewhat entrenched and defensive’, believing it has been ‘unfairly characterised, criticised and is broadly misunderstood’.
“While there will be examples to justify that view, the overwhelming call from our work is for a new leadership approach and culture,” it said.
Other recommendations
- The inclusion of regulatory requirements within farm assurance standards and audits should be conditional on government and regulators agreeing a form of earned recognition.
- There must be greater coordination in the way farm assurance operates across the UK nations.
- Farm assurance schemes must better position the UK farming industry in world food markets and in competition with imported food. This includes greater clarity on the food production standards of importing food nations.
- All schemes must review and, where necessary, improve their communication with the farming industry in light of the ‘perceived distance that has emerged between some schemes and their farming members’. The report noted that some schemes, including RT, are taking steps to renew their communications strategies.
Reaction
Dr Llewellyn said farm assurance must remain a critical part of farming’s future. “However, for that to happen, significant changes are needed to win back farmer confidence, to build on what already works well and to secure a competitive edge for UK farming on the world stage,” he said.
The RT board said it would ‘take time to fully digest and discuss the meaning of the review findings internally’, including incorporating feedback from its sector boards, and ‘respond in full once this process is complete’.
NPA chief executive Lizzie Wilson said the association looked forward to working with the schemes and others to ‘help deliver reforms that maintain the benefits of farm assurance, while making them fairer and more practical for producers’.
NFU president Tom Bradshaw and NFU Cymru president Aled Jones said they hoped the review ‘will provide a reset moment to enable farm assurance schemes to better deliver for the whole UK food supply chain and our customers’.