Thread by @howemill

I am frankly appalled that @NFUStweets are calling for those areas identified as Ecological Focus Areas to be brought into production as a response to a humanitarian crisis. And this is why 🧵/1

The horrendous situation in Ukraine is absolutely going to have an impact on global food commodities, and that is the real issue here - that our food is traded as a commodity, on a global scale leading, particularly in the UK’s case, to an over reliance on imported food /2

An obvious response is to grow more food here, right? And isn’t that what the NFUS are calling for? Well, no. /3

Over half the arable crops in the UK are grown for animal feed and in Scotland 80% crops are grown for alcohol or animal feed. As such, we could massively increase food security by changing that balance /4

We need to change the way we use our arable land to make sure the crops we grow are suitable for human consumption OR change the expectations of the supply chain to align with the realities of what we can produce here /5

EFAs are by no means perfect, in fact they are pretty flawed BUT they are better than nothing and currently offer refuge of some sort to wildlife and go some way to reduce soil erosion and nutrient loss /6

By taking land out of EFA and into “food production” (that’s wheat/barley for 🥃 and 🐂) actually doesn’t do anything to address food security issues in 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿, rather it’s a regressive step in how we address the existential crises of climate and ecological degradation /7

What we need farming unions to do is work with processors and buyers to identify ways to ensure the crops we can grow can be used directly to make human food. Often, it’s the required homogenisation that means crops are unsuitable, not that they are actually unsuitable /8

The NFU Mutual are trying to sell me insurance at the moment, and I’ve had several phone calls to ask me to become a member - because of my “work with biodiversity” /9

There is absolutely no way that I would pay money to become a member of an organisation that is actively seeking to undo the meagre progress made to enable ecological functioning in agricultural landscapes /10

Food security isn’t about having more productive land, it’s about de-commodifying food, building frameworks for food sovereignty as part of a #GoodFoodNation and addressing inequalities in the food system /11

Shame on you @NFUStweets for using the humanitarian crisis in Ukraine as a way to advance your aims of undermining any attempts to develop a sustainable agroecological food system in Scotland - it’s a disgrace. /12

I desperately hope that @MairiGougeon stays true to her recently released vision for agriculture in Scotland and tells @NFUStweets exactly where to go. /13