I regularly host roundtables with farmers from my constituency to discuss how things are going and my last roundtable had a specific focus on the announcement last spring on farming support and food supply. I feed back the points raised in these discussions to the Ministerial team at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and after my last meeting I wrote to the Minister specifically about retailer behaviour and fairness in the supply chain.
I am assured that the Government is committed to working with businesses and organisations across the food supply chain, including farmers, manufacturing and distribution businesses and retailers, to ensure that we have a thriving food sector in the UK. I welcome that representatives from the whole food supply chain came together at Downing Street in May 2023 to identify ways in which the Government and industry can work together to boost growth, drive innovation, and improve sustainability in the food sector.
Furthermore, I am delighted that following the campaign I supported in August last year, Morrison’s has become the first supermarket to launch a ‘Buy British’ section online.
I hope that this move from Morrison’s will encourage other supermarkets to follow suit. It is vital that we support our farmers and I was very pleased to hear the Prime Minister reaffirming the Government’s support for this campaign. You can read more about this campaign here.
I am aware of the petition on Parliament’s website relating to the Grocery Supply Code of Practice. I am assured that Ministers are committed to tacking contractual unfairness that can exist in the agri-food supply chain and the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) is working to support farmers and ensure they get a fair price for their products.
You might also be interested to know that the Government has launched a review to improve fairness in the fresh produce supply chain, supporting British farmers and growers to receive a fair price for their products and ensuring customers have access to high-quality fresh British products. This review delivers on a key commitment made by the Prime Minister at the Farm to Fork Summit in May and will seek the views of industry on issues including the fairness of contracts between producers and purchasers in the sector, and how supply chain data can be used to support transparency in the negotiation process. The review, which is open until 22 February, can be found here: https://consult.defra.gov.uk/supply-chain-fairness/contractual-relationships-in-the-uk-freshproduce-i/
(January 2024)
