United Kingdom agribusiness report

by S. C.

Like most agricultural industries in Europe, UK farmers are suffering from the residual effects of high input costs followed by falling commodity prices, a deep recession in 2009 and weak to minimal demand growth across the continent. There are some bright spots, notably poultry and cheese consumption and beef production. However, we expect the sectors that are currently struggling, such as pork, milk, and sugar, to continue these trends over the medium term as low demand-squeezed producer margins keep production gains suppressed.

Rice consumption growth to 2014: 13%. Consumers will begin to use rice as a healthy alternative to traditionally eaten bread and potatoes, particularly ready-to-eat rice for increasingly time poor consumers.

Barley production growth to 2013/14: -31%. This will result from massive production gains in Eastern Europe as well as the end of an EU intervention scheme slated for October 2010, which will combine to make UK barley less competitive on global markets.

Beef production growth to 2013/14: 15%. Production increases will come from increased farmer investment as the economy recovers, as well as increasing domestic consumption, and slow but steady macroeconomic growth that will allow people to spend more on beef.

2010 Real GDP Growth: 1% (up from -4.7% in 2009; predicted to average 2.7% from 2009 to 2014).

Real Interest (cash rate eop): 2%. Up from 1.8% eop in 2009.

- Despite having one of the EU's strongest dairy sectors in terms of production, UK dairy farmers struggled in 2008/09 in the wake of falling milk prices, which resulted from a global oversupply and declining consumer demand. However, out to 2013/14, we forecast production to grow by 6% to 15.4mn tonnes. This will largely result from industry consolidation, as inefficient producers will be bought out by stronger competitors.
- Pork production has been steadily declining since 1999/00 and as production declined by 30% up to 2005/06. In 2009/10, we forecast another year-on-year decline to 694,000 tonnes, asproducers struggle to recover from high feed prices and the recent economic turbulence. Over the rest of the forecast period, we expect pork production to decline by 2.7% as cheap imports from the Netherlands and Germany put English farmers at a disadvantage.
- Since 2005/06, the area under sugar beet production has declined by 11%, as sugar proved less profitable than other crops. A key reason for this was the lifting of EU support mechanisms for sugar starting in 2006. Out to 2013/14, we expect sugar production to decline by 16%, which will come from shrinking domestic consumption and a recent free trade agreement between the EU and Africa and the Caribbean that will see an influx of cheaper international sugar into the UK market.