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Agriculture: British Pig Industry

My Lords, I am grateful for having been given this slot on such an historic day and, indeed, for the very impressive list of speakers. I am especially grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Davies, who I know has already had a very busy day. I declare an interest as a farmer, some of whose produce ends up in the pig supply chain. I do not raise pigs, although my father used to include pig farming as one of his recreations in his Who’s Who entry. One of my earliest memories is of herding pigs; indeed, my wife has a picture in her bedroom of me doing so. I also remember—this still haunts me to this day—taking pigs to market. The trailer became detached from the vehicle that was pulling it. Between 1997 and 2007, the size of the UK pig herd fell by 40 per cent. For every 10 pigs that we had in 1999, there are just six today. As well as having higher animal welfare standards than most of our competitors, British pig farmers have never received assistance from the common agricultural policy. The higher production costs that arise from higher welfare standards here were compounded by the rise in feed prices during 2007 and 2008. Prices have been relatively more stable in the past two years, but many pig farmers still struggle to repay the debts that were incurred during the very dark days of 2007 and 2008. The industry, the Government and the rest of the supply chain must work together to ensure that we deliver the recommendation in Defra’s report on the British pig industry, which was published earlier this year, that the price that is paid to farmers properly reflects production costs and that labels are made clearer to show the country of origin and animal welfare and assurance standards. I strongly believe that the whole issue of food security is becoming ever more important. The public sector food procurement initiative, which is otherwise known as the PSFPI, was launched in 2003 and aims to deliver a world-class, sustainable farming and food sector that contributes to a better environment and to healthier and more prosperous communities. It is a cross-departmental strategy that is led by Defra and intended to serve as guidance to all public bodies. Public sector food procurement in England accounts for spending of more than £2 billion each year on the food supply and catering services, and the PSFPI was established by the Government to harness this spending power and to advance certain priority objectives, which are set out in the Defra publication. These include: promoting animal welfare; promoting food safety, including high standards of hygiene; increasing the consumption of healthy and nutritious food; improving sustainability and the efficiency of production, processing and distribution; increasing tenders from small and local producers and their ability to trade; and increasing co-operation among buyers and suppliers and along the entire supply chain. There is, by and large, broad public support for these objectives, including for local sourcing, for animal welfare and for quality and healthy food. In our changing food culture, this is only likely to increase to the point that consumers and public sector staff expect best-practice sourcing as a basic minimum for the food that they eat. Defra leads on this across government departments, and government figures show that a large proportion of publicly procured ham and bacon might not be produced to the animal welfare standards equivalent to those in the United Kingdom. It is important that we build awareness of the high animal welfare standards that the United Kingdom deploys for pigs. Public bodies should also be made aware that, by importing pork or bacon without specifying welfare standards, they might be inadvertently supporting production that would be illegal in this country. Public bodies cannot discriminate in favour of domestic producers, as that is illegal under the European Union treaty and procurement directives. The Office of Government Commerce has produced a set of guidance notes to assist government departments and public sector organisations with this very task. The recent progress made by some departments in sustainable sourcing supports recommendations made by the EFRA Select Committee that all government departments and public sector organisations should be encouraged to buy pigmeat raised to equivalent welfare standards to those in the United Kingdom. The Government, sadly, are failing to support the United Kingdom industry when it comes to public procurement of pigmeat—as indeed is this House, as we heard from the chairman of the Refreshment Department only recently. Bacon is still woefully low, at only 36 per cent, while pork has seen a very sharp fall in the last year. Clear, on-pack, country-of-origin labelling for pork and pork products is more than simply a matter of good housekeeping. With many retailers using imported pigmeat for a high proportion of the pork and pork products that they sell, it is vital that consumers are provided with the information that they need to make informed purchasing decisions. This is especially so as they would be shocked to hear that almost 70 per cent of imported pigmeat would be illegal had it been produced in this country. Furthermore, although much imported pigmeat would be illegal to produce in the UK, labelling rules still allow pigs reared and slaughtered in lower-welfare conditions in other countries, but processed here, to be labelled as British. Competition from these lower-welfare, lower-cost imports have made a major contribution to the 40 per cent decline in the UK breeding herd in the last 10 years. Currently, EU pig producers are disadvantaged by being unable to use lower-cost GM soya in feed. With pressure on the cost of feed, the EU is considering amending its rules to allow its inclusion but, until this is achieved, pig producers will be burdened with much higher costs. Alternative sources of protein are already being considered, which would be capable of replacing soya, but at present they are proving not to be any more cost-effective. If barley prices had kept pace with inflation over the last 25 years, barley would be trading at around £200 a tonne, rather than exactly what it was 25 years ago. Had that happened, we would not have a pig industry in this country at all—a very frightening thought. The closed periods for slurry applications to land mean that farmers have to store their slurries for at least a 20-week period. This is idiotic and will lead to some farmers leaving livestock farming altogether, as they simply cannot afford the capital outlay of slurry storage with no return. It is illogical, given that there are periods during the closed period that are normally dry and mild, when slurries could be so easily applied. It is also illogical as it means that a mass of slurry is applied on the first open day after a closed period. That creates a huge risk of pollution. These regulations take good farming practice decisions out of the hands of farmers, who are, after all, intelligent and skilled practitioners in what they do. On some farms, slurry is pumped from pig units to an anaerobic digestion plant where it is combined with other waste from the food chain to produce renewable energy and biofertiliser. These types of plants are increasingly seen as one of the ways in which to help British farming to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. I hope that Her Majesty’s Government will take this type of project on board and will listen to some of the points that I have tried to highlight tonight.