England set for top three worst harvest as impact of wet winter continues to linger

The Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit (ECIU) used provisional data [2] on English crop areas for wheat, winter and spring barley, oats and oilseed rape combined with yield forecasts [3] from the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board (AHDB) to estimate this year’s harvest for these key crops, which is set to be one of the worst three since detailed records began in 1983, just behind 2020 and 2001,

Although the harvest is not quite as poor as feared in the spring immediately following this year’s wet winter, it is still historically bad, leaving the UK dependent on imports to meet demand for bread and other baked goods. The wet winter was made ten times more likely by climate change, with storm rainfall 20% heavier [4].

Commenting on the analysis, Tom Lancaster, land, food and farming analyst at the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit said, “It’s been a year to forget for many farmers, as the recent benign summer has failed to make up for six months of seemingly endless rain over the winter, the effects of which are now becoming apparent.

“More than most, farmers are on the front line of climate change, and this is what that looks like. Extreme weather is already feeding through to higher food bills and a greater reliance on imports. Measures that capture carbon can also make farms more resilient with more hedges and trees helping to cut prevent soil loss, and healthier soils recovering faster from floods and drought.”

Climate change has been shown to have a major impact on food prices, with extreme weather adding £361 to the average household food bill in 2022 and 2023 [5].

The English wheat harvest is estimated to be more than 2.2m tonnes or 18% down on 2023. And the rest of Britain has fared no better. The harvest for the whole of Britain is also set to be one of the worst in decades [6}, with the total harvest for these five crops down by over 13% or 3m tonnes on the five-year average.

Earlier industry forecasts were even more pessimistic, and previous ECIU analysis [8] did predict a bigger deficit compared to previous years. Worryingly, this lower total could still come to pass in the event of a 5% smaller overall crop area than forecast [9]. This would knock close to a million tonnes off the projected wheat harvest according to ADHB figures. Applied to the other winter crops – winter barley and oilseed rape – crop areas 5% less than current estimates would make 2024 Britain’s worst harvest this century.

Ongoing questions about crop quality due to the wet winter and dull early summer are also causing some concerns for milling wheat, used to make flour for bread and other baked goods [10].

Martin Lines, farmer and chief executive of the Nature Friendly Farming Network said, “I’ve never known a year like this one, and I don’t want to see another like it again. Given the extremes we’ve seen in recent years though, that seems an unrealistic hope given the climate impacts we now have to contend with.

“Extreme weather is making farming harder and it’s the main threat to our food security. Farmers need support in preparing for and coping with droughts and floods. Properly-funded government land management schemes are a vital first step, and have helped me to increase the resilience of my farming by improving my soil health, and boosting the amount of wildlife on my farm. I’m on tenterhooks now to see what happens at the budget.”

More sustainable land management has been shown to increase resilience to climate impacts and improve productivity on farms [11], and Defra’s green farm payments are helping an increasing number of farmers. Recent reports [12] however suggest that the budget for these schemes is under pressure, as the Chancellor seeks to make savings ahead of the Budget at the end of October.

Notes to editors:

1. The analysis is available to download here.
2. https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/cereal-and-oilseed-rape-areas-in-england/cereal-and-oilseed-rape-areas-in-england-at-1-june-2023 (-> eciu.us8.list-manage.com)
3. https://ahdb.org.uk/cereals-oilseeds/gb-harvest-progress (-> eciu.us8.list-manage.com)
4. https://www.worldweatherattribution.org/autumn-and-winter-storms-over-uk-and-ireland-are-becoming-wetter-due-to-climate-change/ (-> eciu.us8.list-manage.com)
5. https://eciu.net/media/press-releases/2023/families-hit-by-605-food-bill-as-extreme-weather-and-energy-crisis-bites (-> eciu.us8.list-manage.com)
6. 2024 is likely to the third worst harvest for Great Britain since 2000, after 2001 and 2020. Defra only publish data for the UK or England going back to 1983, so it was not possible to unpick GB figures from the UK data before 2000, but the likelihood is that 2024 will be the third worst harvest since 1983 for these crops.
7. https://ahdb.org.uk/cereals-oilseeds/early-bird-survey (-> eciu.us8.list-manage.com)
8. https://eciu.net/media/press-releases/2024/uk-food-security-winter-washout-could-cut-harvests-by-a-fifth (-> eciu.us8.list-manage.com)
9. https://ahdb.org.uk/news/how-much-wheat-can-we-expect-from-harvest-24-grain-market-daily (-> eciu.us8.list-manage.com)
10. https://ahdb.org.uk/news/lower-proteins-persist-as-wheat-harvest-presses-on-grain-market-daily (-> eciu.us8.list-manage.com)
11. https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full/10.1098/rspb.2015.1740 (-> eciu.us8.list-manage.com)
12. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/sep/03/englands-nature-friendly-farming-budget-to-be-cut-by-100m (-> eciu.us8.list-manage.com)

For more information or for interview requests:

George Smeeton, Head of Communications, ECIU, Tel: +44 (0)7894 571 153, email: george.smeeton@eciu.net