Storm Clouds from Food Warlords gather over UK Agriculture

Has the time come for a new farmer-consumer alliance?

"Let the heir to the throne enjoy his excellent if somewhat risky organic food..... Let my cattle enjoy their genetically modified soya."
Lord Haskins, Chairman of Northern Foods,
Provision Trade Federation annual dinner, 2001

August 2001  

As if things could not get any worse for UK agriculture Tony Blair's remedy for crisis ridden British farming is to put food industry magnate and 'free' trade enthusiast, Lord Charles Haskins, in charge of the government's rural 'rescue' attempt following on from the foot-and-mouth crisis.  This is about as comforting to farmers as putting a fox in charge of national chicken security.   

Lord Haskins, appointed by the Prime Minister as the UK's 'rural recovery co-ordinator' at the beginning of August, is a key advocate of 'liberalised' world trade and the introduction of genetically modified foods. He is also a fan of food-chain 'consolidation' - a code term for the creation of monopolistic food industry structures under which farmers are forced to become very unequal business 'partners' with giant food manufacturers and processors.  

At the start of his 'recovery' activities Lord Haskins has suggested that half of the UK's farms (already the biggest on average in the EU) will disappear in the next 20 years (London Times, August 7, 2001). The prospect of a corporate-food-chain led suffocation of the nation's farming community now spreading to the UK looks increasingly likely. This is a process which is already well underway in the US. It is a process which has been unaffectionately described by Professor John Ikerd of the University of Missouri as 'the final stage of industrialization'. The final stage of industrialisation is, as Professor Ikerd indicates, the consolidation of decision making under corporate control.  

However, the night is always darkest just before dawn, and Professor Ikerd portrays an altogether different vision for the future of 21st century farming in his remarkable paper 'Crisis and opportunity in North American agriculture' . The implementation of such an enlightened vision does, however, require action - and not just in the US.  

British farmers urgently need to unite with consumers in a joint alliance to stem the unfolding industrialised food agenda that biotech promoting food-chain warlords like Lord Haskins (to say nothing of supermarket magnate-cum-government minister-cum-Labour Party funder-cum-GM investor Lord David Sainsbury) are providing to Prime Minister 'Townie' Blair. It is surely time now for the NFU to rise up and lead British agriculture out of this trap before the farming community becomes physically and politically invisible. It is surely now time to act decisively before the 'culture' in British 'agri-culture' is consigned to the history books for ever.  

More and more consumers are ready to join forces with farmers to achieve this. The time has never been more ripe for the creation of a new alliance between farmers and consumers to revamp the structure and quality of the food chain for their mutual phyiscal and spiritual enrichment. Now is the moment.  

But what is the nature of the beast that farmers and consumers are up against? Lord Haskins is chairman of Express Dairies as well as Northern Foods. Northern Foods has a turnover of £1.4 billion a year. In his chairman's speech to its annual general meeting on 19 July 2001 Lord Haskins proclaimed: "During the first quarter we raised our selling prices in many product sectors to recover ... higher costs."  

With these words in mind it is not so difficult to see why dominant players in the rest of the food chain can make money out of British agriculture whilst farmers, as the source providers of our food, are losing it - processors and retailers just put up their sale prices. As their 'consolidation' grows the middlemen between farmers and consumers are increasingly securing a 'cost-plus' basis of operation. Meanwhile many UK farm product prices are at, or are near, record lows and there's little that farmers can immediately do about it. They continue to operate on a 'price-minus' basis.  

A recent survey by Lloyds TSB reveals that - contrary to the claims of Lord Haskins - farmers do not want large subsidies. They, do however, want to receive a fair price for what they produce from companies like Northern Foods and the quasi-monopolistic retailing chains they supply.  

This, however, does not prevent Lord Haskins from describing British farmers as 'mollycoddled' in an interview with the London Times, August 7th. There are indeed still some substantial and profitable farm businesses in the UK but they are a shrinking minority. The average UK farmer earned just £5,200 for the financial year to February 2001, way below the official national minimum wage. Farmer suicides continue unabated.  

Meanwhile Lord Haskins' salary from Northern Foods in 1998 was £208,479, together with share options than gained him £380,388. From Express Dairies he received a further salary of £104,000.  

Northern Foods produce food under the brand names Fox's, Ski, Eden Vale, Munch Bunch, Goodfella's, Hollands pies, Dalepak, Ross, Pork Farms Bowyers and own-label food for Sainsbury's, Tesco, Marks and Spencer and Asda. They produce the buns for Burger King, Farley's Rusks under licence, and Batchelors Baked Beans in Ireland. They own NFT, one of the largest chilled food distributors in the UK.  

Express Dairies is the UK's largest supplier of milk to supermarkets and the largest supplier of UHT (otherwise known by detractors as 'ultra horrible tasting') milk and cream. It has been in merger 'consolidation' talks with Wiseman Dairies, who are under official investigation following charges of price fixing. The Competition Commission has already concluded that Wiseman has been operating a monopoly in Scotland. Haskins wants Express Dairies to join forces with these people.  

Charles Haskins is a donor to the Labour Party and was made a Lord by Tony Blair in 1998.  

NATURAL LAW PARTY WESSEX
nlpwessex@bigfoot.com
www.btinternet.com/~nlpwessex  

  "As retailers grow larger through acquisitions and mergers, they develop their own vertically integrated distribution systems that tend to shut out wholesalers, small processors and smaller retailers.....These large retail firms are able to develop one-on-one relationships with dominant food manufacturers that can service their far-flung systems....Thus, food manufacturers become more focused on serving the interests of food retailers rather than the interests of farmers.....

Just a half-century ago, economists were justifying and promoting a decentralized agriculture production and processing system. As the economic system changed, so also did the economic theory that justified it. Today, much economic theory defends a highly centralized monopolistic or near monopolistic system....

A growing chorus of voices from a wide variety of political backgrounds is beginning to challenge the ideology - the assumptions, beliefs and values - of neoclassical economic theory that underpins the current economic system. Many feel that the loss of economic democracy may also lead to a loss of political democracy - and nowhere is that more apparent than in food.

The massive consolidation in food retailing that has taken place in the last few years seems to indicate that power is shifting toward the retail sector, as the structure of the agricultural system is determined by what consumers are conditioned to eat.....

Long protected from the ups and downs of the commodity markets, consumers are now beginning to see a direct economic impact from this near monopolistic food system as they experience increases in their food prices even when prices farmers receive for a commodity ......declines..... When will consumers become more proactive in challenging this emerging system?

For all of us, the question remains, who is going to have the power to make decisions about what food is produced, who will produce it, where and under what conditions it will be produced, and ultimately who will get to eat?..."
From
'CONSOLIDATION IN FOOD RETAILING AND DAIRY: Implications for Farmers and Consumers in a Global Food System', Report to National Farmers Union, Jan 2001, University of Missouri

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