The NPA has urged the Treasury to ensure there is sufficient spending on biosecurity and border controls to protect the UK from diseases like African swine fever (ASF), among its four key asks, ahead of the autumn budget.
NPA senior policy adviser Tom Haynes said: “There is little doubt that this is going to be anything but an unpleasant budget for a lot of sectors, and the consistent message out Downing Street is that ‘there are more difficult decisions to come’, with each department in Whitehall fighting for every penny of their existing spend.”
“One such department that is tipped to see spending reductions is Defra, with a trailed £100 million reduction in the farming budget.”
The NPA’s submission has, against this backdrop, set out four key requests, ahead of the October 30 budget, the first of which is ongoing work to help boost the UK’s biosecurity and protect it from notifiable disease, especially given the prevalence of ASF in parts of the EU and the risk of foot and mouth Ddsease (FMD).
“Illegal meat imports through Dover are a huge concern, and we wish to see additional resource given to Dover Port Health Authority to help them expand their current inspection regime,” Mr Haynes said.
The second centres on the continuation and expansion of grant funding, helping to support producers to modernise and improve their units.
The third echoes the calls made by the NFU to ensure there are no changes to Agricultural Property Relief (APR). We believe APR is essential to the confidence of family farms, helping to ensure that tenanted farms are still available and keeping small family businesses viable.
“Last and by no means least, we along with many other organisations in our sector, are calling for an increased multi-year agriculture budget for the duration of the next Parliament,” he added.
“The agriculture budget in the previous Parliament was £3.1 billion a year. HMT now must be clear that the food security, climate change and environmental challenges we face need to be matched by a renewed and improved financial budget.”
“This isn’t just the view of ourselves and the NFU, it is also the view of environmental NGOs as well, highlighting cross-sector consensus on the urgent need for a ring-fenced agriculture budget.
“Furthermore, this isn’t just ‘money for farmers’, it is funding that will give farmers the confidence to invest for the future and help make the government’s aims around sustainable food production, food security, energy security, the environment and net zero possible.”
NFU budget call
NFU president Tom Bradshaw has today urged the Government to take action to value UK food security and ensure important environmental delivery by increasing the current agriculture budget £5.6 billion on October 30.
“This budget is essential in giving Britain’s farmers and growers the confidence they desperately need to invest for the future and deliver on our joint ambitions on producing more sustainable, affordable homegrown food while creating more jobs and delivering for nature, energy security and climate-friendly farming,” he said.
But he described confirmation of a huge underspend on the agriculture budget by Defra over the past three years as a ‘kick in the teeth’ for the farming industry.