Agriculture in the United Kingdom
Agriculture in the United Kingdom uses 69% of the country's land area, employs 1% of its workforce (471,000 people)[1][2] and contributes 0.5% of its gross value added (£11.2 billion).[3] The UK currently produces about 54% of its domestic food consumption.[4]
Agricultural activity occurs in most rural locations. It is concentrated in the drier east (for crops) and the wetter west (for livestock).[5] There are 191,000 farm holdings, which vary widely in size.[6]
Despite skilled farmers, advanced technology, fertile soil and subsidies, farm earnings are relatively low, mainly due to low prices at the farm gate. Low earnings, high land prices and a shortage of let farmland discourage young people from joining the industry. The average (median) age of the British farm holder is about 60 (as of 2016).[7][8][9][10]
Recently there have been moves towards organic farming in an attempt to sustain profits, and many farmers supplement their income by diversifying activities away from pure agriculture. Biofuels present new opportunities for farmers against a background of rising fears about fossil fuel prices, energy security, and climate change. There is increasing awareness that farmers have an important role to play as custodians of the British countryside and wildlife.[11]
Current overview[edit]
The total area of agricultural holdings is about 41.6 million acres (16.8 million hectares), of which about a third are arable and most of the rest is grassland. In 2022 only 4.4 million hectares (10.9 millon acres) were planted. The remainder lay fallow or as temporary grassland. During the growing season about 72% of the arable area is cereal crops,[12] and of the cereal crop area, more than 57% is wheat. There are about 33 million sheep, 9.6 million cattle, 188 million poultry and 5.2 million pigs. These are arranged on about 191,000 holdings, whose average croppable area is around 69 hectares (170 acres). About 70% of farms are owner-occupied or mostly so (perhaps with individual barns or fields let out), and the remainder are rented to tenant farmers. Farmers represent an ageing population, partly due to low earnings and barriers to entry, and it is increasingly hard to recruit young people into farming. The average farm holder is about 60 years old.[8][9][13]
In 2022 with 15,540,000 metric tons, the UK ranked as the 14th largest producer of wheat in the world.[14]
British farming is on the whole intensive and highly mechanised. This approach is well-suited to the current distribution infrastructure, but can be less productive by area than smaller scale, diversified farming.[15] The UK produces only 60% of the food it consumes. The vast majority of imports and exports are with other Western European countries.[16]
Farming is subsidised, with subsidies to farmers totalling more than £3 billion (after deduction of levies).[17]
Regional variations[edit]
While there is little difference between farming practices in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland in places where the terrain is similar, the geography and the quality of the farmland does have an impact. In Wales, 80% of the farmland is designated as a "Less Favoured Area", and in Scotland the figure is 84%. "Less Favoured Area" means land that produces a lower agricultural yield, typically upland moors and hill farms, which explains the tendency to focus on sheep and sometimes dairy farming. In England, the eastern and southern areas where the fields are flatter, larger and more open tend to concentrate on cereal crops, while the hillier northern and western areas with smaller, more enclosed fields tend to concentrate on livestock farming.[18][19][20][21]
History[edit]
Before 1500[edit]
Farming was introduced in the British Isles between about 5000 BC and 4500 BC after a large influx of Mesolithic people and following the end of the Pleistocene epoch. It took 2,000 years for the practice to extend across all of the isles. Wheat and barley were grown in small plots near the family home. Sheep, goats and cattle came in from mainland Europe, and pigs were domesticated from wild boar already living in forests.[22] There is evidence of agricultural and hunter-gatherer groups meeting and trading with one another in the early part of the Neolithic.[23]
The Saxons and the Vikings had open-field farming systems and there was an expansion of arable farming between the 8th-13th centuries in England [24] Under the Normans and Plantagenets fens were drained, woods cleared and farmland expanded to feed a rising population, until the Black Death reached Britain in 1349. This and subsequent epidemics caused the population to fall; one-third of the population in England died between 1349 and 1350. In consequence, areas of farmland were abandoned. The feudal system began to break down as labourers, who were in short supply following the plague, demanded wages (instead of subsistence) and better conditions. Also, there were a series of poor harvests after about 1315, coinciding with some evidence (from tree rings) of poor weather across the whole of northern Europe, which continued on and off until about 1375. The population did not recover to 1300 levels for 200 to 300 years.[citation needed]
The last surviving working mediaeval strip farming system with common grazings is in Laxton, Nottinghamshire in England. The system is documented by detailed maps made in 1635 recording numbers against on the map. The owners and extent of the rights are in an accompanying set of ledger entries against the numbers recorded on the maps.
1500 to 1750[edit]
When King Henry VIII named himself Supreme Head of the Church of England in 1531, he set about the dissolution of the monasteries, which was largely complete by 1540. The monasteries had been among the principal landowners in the Kingdom and the Crown took over their land, amounting to about 2,000,000 acres (810,000 ha). This land was largely sold off to fund Henry's military ambitions in France and Scotland, and the main buyers were the aristocracy and landed gentry. Agriculture boomed as grain prices increased sixfold by 1650. Improvements in transport, particularly along rivers and coasts, brought beef and dairy products from the north of England to London.[25]
Jethro Tull, a Berkshire farmer, invented his famous rotating-cylinder seed drill. His 1731 book, The New Horse Hoeing Husbandry, explained the systems and devices he espoused to improve agriculture. The book had such an impact that its influence can still be seen in some aspects of modern farming. Charles Townsend, a viscount known as "Turnip Townsend", in the 1730s introduced turnip farming on a large scale. This created a four-crop rotation (wheat, turnips, barley and clover) which allowed fertility to be maintained with much less fallow land. Clover increases mineral nitrogen in the soil and clover and turnips are good fodder crops for livestock, which in turn improve the soil by their manure.[26][27][28]
1750 to 1850[edit]
Between 1750 and 1850, the English population nearly tripled, with an estimated increase from 5.7 million to 16.6 million, and all these people had to be fed from the domestic food supply. This was achieved through intensified agriculture and land reclamation from the Fens, woodlands, and upland pastures. The crop mix changed too, with wheat and rye replacing barley. Nitrogen fixing plants such as legumes led to sustainable increased yields. These increased yields, combined with improved farming machinery and then-new capitalist ways of organising labour, meant that increased crop production did not need much more manpower, which freed labour for non-agricultural work. Indeed, by 1850 Britain had the smallest proportion of its population engaged in farming of any country in the world, at 22%.[29][30][31]
During the 18th century, a large share of farmers had the ability to use numerical skills and the ability to read and write, both being skills that were not widespread in the early modern period.[32]
Enclosures[edit]
General[edit]
Open fields divided among several tenants originally had the advantage of reducing risks by giving all farmers diverse soils and crops so no one faced famine when others prospered. But the system was inefficient. Poor farmers got as much land as good farmers. By the 18th century enclosures came in poorer regions where several landholders were more willing to sell land. After 1760, though, parliamentary legislation permitted the enclosure of wealthier lands that had more complex structures of ownership. The result was an added £4 million to England's national income.[33]
During the 18th and 19th centuries, enclosures were by means of special acts of Parliament. They consolidated strips in the open fields into more cohesive units, and enclosed much of the remaining pasture commons or wastes. Enclosure consisted of exchange in land, and an extinguishing of common rights. This allowed farmers to consolidate and fence off their own large plots of land, in contrast to multiple small strips spread out and separated. Voluntary enclosure was also frequent at that time.[34]
At the time of the parliamentary enclosures, most manors had seen consolidation of tenant farms into multiple large landholdings. Multiple larger landholders already held the bulk of the land.[35] They 'held' but did not legally own in today's sense. They also had to respect the open field system rights, when demanded, even when in practice the rights were not widely in use. Similarly each large landholding would consist of scattered patches, not consolidated farms. In many cases enclosures were largely an exchange and consolidation of land, and exchange not otherwise possible under the legal system. Enclosure under the scheme of the Inclosure Act of 1773[36] permitted the fencing and regulation of arable land in accordance with the wishes of three quarters of the owners in number and value of the land in question.[37] Regulations and allotments made were valid for 6 years.[38] The lord of the manor and three quarters of the commoners acting together were empowered to lease one twelfth of the land for the improvement of the remainder.[39]
Enclosure following private or local Act of Parliament could also involve the extinguishment of common rights. Without unanimous extinguishment, the entire system survived at common law. With land one held, one could not formally exchange the land, consolidate fields, or entirely exclude others. Strict enforcement of legal rights may not always have been seen in practice. Parliamentary enclosure was seen as a cost-effective method of creating a legally binding settlement. This is because of the costs (time, money, complexity) of using the common law and equity legal systems. Statute required consent of the owners of 4/5-ths of the land (copy and freeholders).[citation needed]
The primary benefits to large land holders came from increased value of their own land, not from expropriation. Smaller holders could sell their land to larger ones for a higher price post enclosure. There was not much evidence that the common rights were particularly valuable.[40] Protests against Parliamentary Enclosure continued, sometimes in Parliament itself, frequently in the villages affected, and sometimes as organised mass revolts.[41] Voluntary enclosure was frequent at that time.[42] Enclosed land was twice as valuable, a price which could be sustained only by its higher productivity.[43]
Enclosures in Scotland[edit]
Enclosure in Scotland is associated with sudden and large-scale clearances, perhaps due to the prevalence of cottar tenure whereby a dwelling and a small area of land is made available for so long only as the owner of it allows.[44]
Depression 1815-1836[edit]
The period 1750-1850 included a twenty-year depression in agriculture 1815 to 1836. It was so severe that landlords as well as tenants suffered financial ruin, and large areas of farmland were entirely abandoned. The ancient landlord and tenant system was unsuited to new-style, capital-intensive farms. Parliament began to review the legislation, for example by distinguishing between farm improvements that the tenant should fund, and those the landlord should fund.[45] Parliament was concerned with the issue of tenant right, i.e. the sum payable to an outgoing tenant for farm improvements that the tenant had funded and, if crops were in the ground when the tenant left, compensation for their value. This was dealt with in accordance with local custom, which might vary from place to place. In 1848 a parliamentary committee examined the possibility of a standardised system, but a Bill on the matter was not passed until 1875.[46]
The Corn Laws and their Repeal[edit]
In the period 1815 to 1846 Corn Laws were enacted designed to protect domestic agriculture by imposing a tax on foreign imported grain. Their repeal was ultimately secured after major political lobbying by the Anti-Corn Law League. The issue was divisive because of the increased urbanisation of the UK and its need for cheap food, as well as the general influence of free trade doctrines. The repeal of the Corn Laws initially steadied grain prices. Experts differ over whether by 1846 the Corn Laws were still relevant, because of low prices and/or self-sufficiency in grain.[47]
