Cereal production equivalent to more than a tenth of crop growing land ‘wiped out’ by extreme weather – new analysis

“It is sometimes reported that action to tackle climate change will lead to farmland being ‘lost’. What this analysis makes clear is that extreme weather, made worse by climate change, is already hitting the production of staple crops, to the extent that we have already seen production wiped out in the last two years that is equivalent to more than a tenth of our wheat and barley growing area. 
 
“With extremes set to worsen until the world reaches net zero emissions, continuing as we are is not an option. The Land Use Framework aims to guide choices to help build our resilience, planting new woods and trees to reduce flood risk to towns and villages whilst ensuring food production remains the central purpose of farming.”
 
2024 and 2025 were England’s third and second worst harvests on record respectively [3]. England’s wettest October to March ever [4] in 2023/24 ruined farmers ability to drill and manage crops, whilst spring 2025 was the hottest on record and driest for over 100 years [5], hitting crop yields.
 
The poor harvests in 2024 and 2025 were caused by wet weather in autumn 2023 and in some areas in autumn 2024 preventing farmers from sowing key crops, particularly wheat and winter barley. The impacts of ongoing wet weather in 2023/2024 and the very dry spring in 2025 then reduced per hectare yield. It is the combination of reduced crop area and yield as a result of extreme weather that had such as impact.
 
Previous ECIU analysis estimated that poor harvests following extreme weather this decade have reduced UK milling wheat production equivalent to over a year’s supply of bread [6].
 
Commenting further, Tom Lancaster, land, food and farming analyst at the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit (ECIU) said, “The recent impacts of unprecedented extreme weather on broad acre arable farming in England point to a future of increasingly unmanageable impacts on food production and farm incomes. The evidence is clear that if we want to maintain and improve UK food security, we need to reduce emissions to net zero, whilst doing much more to build the resilience of our farming sector and wider economy.
 
“Defra’s land use framework is an important step in understanding how we can do this most effectively, maximising the benefits for nature and people, whilst still ensuring that we can grow the majority of our own food.”