Royal Welsh supports Church on Fairtrade Report
The Royal Welsh Agricultural Society has expressed its unequivocal support for the Church of England’s Ethical Investment Advisory Group report on ‘Fairtrade begins at home – supermarkets and the effects on British farming livelihoods’.
The report identifies a number of what it describes as ‘invisible and pernicious practices’ of which consumers are largely unaware and which have been accepted by farmers as a fait accompli as part of the price of doing business.
As a result of the report the Church has told the Competition Commission that the pursuit of cheap food coupled with the buying power of the big supermarkets is putting farming livelihoods at risk.
“We congratulate the Church for carrying out this project which clearly illustrates many of the issues that are presently creating an uncertain future for farmers and that will lead to the inevitable decline of the agricultural industry,” said Royal Welsh Chairman of Council, Alun Evans. “Farmers in Wales are having to contend with severe financial hardship and if they are driven out of business this is certain to result in wider adverse social consequences in the countryside and will ultimately affect consumers and the food supply as well.”
The report points out that there are many complex reasons for the malaise in British farming but the pursuit of cheap food coupled with the skewed buying power of the food majors is undoubtedly contributing to the difficulties of the sector. Practices cited in the report include food labelling that obscures the country of origin of the primary ingredients of some products labelled as British but often only processed and packaged here; flexible contract terms that seldom work to the advantage of the farmer; flexible payment terms that, subject to arbitrary change, have often put farmers to increased cost and financial loss; facilitation payments; deductions and a range of financial inducements paid to the retailer or processor at the farmer’s expense. There is little evidence, says the report, that retailers share the benefits of promotions with farmers, and much evidence that farmers, in the main, bear the costs.
The report also focuses on the dairy industry where retailer price competitiveness for a staple product has led to a significant reduction in the number of dairy herds, placing many of those remaining at the margins of economic viability. It acknowledges that more recently there have been some positive signs of change.
The report calls for supermarkets to:
• Examine their buying practices and provide greater clarity and transparency to suppliers and consumers.
• Root out the worst abuses of buying practices.
• Publish a buying code of how they do business with local producers or expect middlemen to conduct business relationships through the supply chain with producers.
• Avoid arbitrary changes and termination to contracts without considered notice.
It concludes: “Farmers are asking for no more than a fair price for a fair product which requires a connection to be made by the British consumer that fair trade begins at home with British produce, reared and farmed by British producers.”