Would like to know which supermarkets are de-listing Russian goods

Casdon

I don’t believe what you say Katie59, the UK does import foodstuffs from all over the world, but it’s because people want access to a much wider range of foods all year round, not because of the environmental lobby. If people wanted to eat more lamb, potatoes, carrots, swede and green beans we’d be self sufficient again, but they don’t.

It is the policy of the government to source more food from overseas - fact. Farmers are being paid more to plant whole fields - not just field margins for environmental projects. Whole farms are being left for “wilding” because the environmental payments are much easier.

On the other side of the debate there is plenty of food we could buy from overseas that is cheaper because it is produced to lower environmental and welfare standards, while our farmers are tightly regulated.

I know that Katie59, but ultimately consumer choice is dictating what is grown in the UK, and what is eaten. We all have choices. We have to move to a more environmentally friendly society, and it’s too simplistic to say that it’s down to government policy, because you can’t bring back the past way of eating, there’s a huge amount we can’t grow successfully in the UK.

Peartree

Why do we buy wheat from abroad? Are we not a nation of farmers?

We are building houses on our farmland because our increasing population needs homes.

The amount of land we are building on is insignificant compared with the amount that is farmed and much of it will not be suitable for growing grains.

We have been buying wheat from abroad for over 150 years. Quite simply the huge wheat praires of Canada, US and Ukraine can grow wheat far more cheaply than we do and the size of the population in the UK now compared with other countries, is so large we cannot be self sufficient.

Is that true Monica, or is it that we can’t be self sufficient if we continue eating the way we do? We’ve got one of the best climates in the world for growing vegetables, but we want more exotic fare.

Canadian bread wheat in particular is very expensive in comparison currently around £300 a ton, although they have economy of scale yields are low. The UK does produce at world prices, currently wheat prices are high and farms are growing as much as they are allowed to by regulations.
Vegetables are limited by the availability of migrant labour for harvesting and processing, a lot is grown overseas and often transported by air to the UK not just out of season either, realistically more fruit and veg is going to be imported because labour, is cheaper, workers can be paid at Bulgarian or Kenyan rates.

JL and therefore Waitrose are removing Russian goods from sale.

Peartree

Why do we buy wheat from abroad? Are we not a nation of farmers?

our local farmers are growing biofuel on very fertile fields, that and oilseed rape to add to diesel. Good fertile land should be used to grow food. One field behind me was used year after year for winter wheat for animal feed. Thank heavens the new generation (son) has now diversified and started rotations

If people wanted to eat more lamb, potatoes, carrots, swede and green beans we’d be self sufficient again, but they don’t.

Ooh I could do quite happily! Every night, my yummiest meal. Sounds lush.

A Lancashire hotpot one day. Roast potatoes with roast lamb another day. Minced lamb in a shepherd’s pie with the veg?
I’ll shut up now ...

Katie59:

'The political influence of the environment lobby is costing us dear, thats fine for those that can afford to pay.' (sic) -

we can't afford not to pay. Slowing down the destruction of the planet is rather more important than the cost of living. I don't see it as 'political', just a case of the results of our collective ignorance, greed - and sheer stupidity - coming home to roost.

Shouldn't our main concern be the survival of our grandchildren? We still have plenty of choice. For instance, we have no nutritional need to eat wheat.

Can I come round Urms? Sounds delicious. No out of season foreign veg here!

Yes do come over GSM! You could cook. I’ll pour the wine...
#lazygran

(I rest my case!)

It must just be the other 65 million eating it then Germanshepherdsmum. Seriously, I can’t see us going back to the traditional all grown in Britain way of eating.

You’d regret it if I cooked Urms!
I shall carry on with my British fruit and veg Casdon. Roast potatoes, parsnips, carrots and sprouts on Sunday.

I do my best to eat seasonal veg grown in the uk. It can done. I have a very small garden and have chosen not to grow grass. I am self-sufficient in apples, gooseberries, blackcurrants, blueberries and strawberries. I also have 4x 1m beds in rotation, to grow salad potatoes, dwarf beans, carrots, purple sprouting brocolli, brussels sprouts, shallots, beetroot, lettuce, radish. I grow asparagus amongst my apple trees, roses and sedums. On the patio I have many troughs of the pink and red flowered strawberries, instead of annuals. I grow many herbs in a veg trug and have areas ready for tomato plants in growbags and also courgettes and mini cucumber in growbags

The roses, sedums, hellebores, echinaceae, heleanthemums, lavenders, pinks, 2 small rowan trees and ornamental grasses add colour and attract bees and birds. All this and a water feature for me and birds and insects, in my small potager garden. Yes we can grow much of our food, it just takes a willingness to do it.

The only out of season we use is stuff grown in the garden from the freezer, although I’ve still got Carrots and Brussels fresh from the garden.

Well I also eat vegetables from the UK, including ones I’ve grown, as well as bananas, oranges, avocados, peanuts, peppers, my favourite olives - and I drink coffee, and wine, and I eat chocolate. I’m obviously not as virtuous as others, but I’m happy with my choices.

It would be good to see an area for allotments included on all housing development sites, or other pockets of land not in use, waiting lists for those existing are huge. A small, but not insignificant, if it took off, contribution to feeding people, encouraging the next generation too.

Tesco still had Russian vodka on it shows this afternoon

Shelves!!

I very much doubt that this will affect anyone on this site, but Coca Cola are continuing to sell their goods in Russia. Time to sanction them, although it should be no hardship.
-disgusting stuff.

We cannot currently grow enough food to support the population. And there is nothing remarkable about that. We have been importing wheat from Canada since the 1860s and the great farming slump that lasted from the 1870s to the start of WW2 was caused by the fact that our farmers could not compete on cost with prairie farmers elsewhere.

We still needed to import food during WW2 -and the population then was around 40-45 million, compared with 65-70 million now.

I am not sure whether the UK could be self sufficient, but if we were the diet, would be dull, limited. The medieval peasant subsisted on a diet of rye bread, pottage, a stew of beans, peas and onions, and probably kept a pig and occasionally added a fatty pork to their diet, plus foraging. Milk and dairy products were probably market products sold to the better off.

The industrial worker in the early 19th relied on bread for his main sustenance with cheese, occasional meat and amything they could raise on an allottment, if they had one.

Even allowing for the improvement in the range of cultivars and their higher cropping rates - and farming technology. Our diet would be very limited.

Hetty58 between going vegan and not eating wheat. our diet will be very limited and boring.

Far more can be done by simply reducing our consumption of meat and ensuring that the cattle we breed live only on grass and hay. Soya, wheat and maize are not natural foods for cattle and are the main reason they they emit so much methane. James Rebank has pointed out that it is possible that cattle raised under a Pasture for Life initiative could actually be carbon neutral.