Locally grown food set to flourish

Apr 15 2008 by Jill Evans, Western Mail

THIS is an important time in the Welsh fruit and vegetable industry. After a period of decline, all the indicators now point to the potential for growth. This is very welcome news given the many benefits of locally grown produce, particularly organic food.

Getting more local produce into shops and on to dinner tables is a priority for the One Wales Government with its commitment to a major initiative on local food procurement. Countryside Minister Elin Jones has launched an action plan to encourage the local food sector which will benefit the local economy, the environment and our health. And as she said at the Wales Horticulture Conference, there are now more opportunities for producers of all sizes.

The Government action will make it much easier for schools and local authorities to buy food locally, giving a much needed boost to the sector. Some areas of Wales already have very exciting policies on buying locally for schools and that should be extended throughout the country.

If local councils succeed in encouraging the sourcing and growing of food locally, this will be a huge step forward. People are increasingly concerned about food miles and the effects on the environment of flying food hundreds of miles around the world when most of it can be produced here - not to mention the benefits of having really fresh food.

Making land available for conversion into allotments and community gardens must also be a priority. Local councils should be looking at what public land in their areas could be released to allow local people to grow their own food. It would improve the land and the local environment as well as meeting the needs of the many people on council waiting lists for an allotment of their own. Local gardening groups have been pushing for this for years while councils have gone the opposite way and sold off more and more allotment land for housing development. Now is the time for us to change that.

Helping support and develop the local food sector has been a priority for me as a Welsh representative in Brussels. As well as campaigning for better labelling and origin marking, I have successfully amended EU Regional Development Guidelines to call for more support for local farmers’ markets and local procurement generally. Farmers’ markets are hugely popular, of course.

Demand often outstrips supply, with surveys suggesting that while 30% of people buy food produced locally, around 70% would like to do so if it was available. More and more “vegetable box” schemes are operating where people have a box of vegetables delivered every week to their door.

The Mintel report published earlier this year said that one in seven people in Wales now regularly buys organic food and it predicted a huge growth in demand over the coming years.

The Horticulture Network Wales – part-funded by the EU – is another important initiative helping the local food sector and provides a wealth of information on www.horticulturenetworkwales.org

Encouragement to “grow your own” goes hand in hand with people’s awareness of and wish to help combat climate change. It fits well with the campaigns for healthy eating. The aim – and one we can achieve in Wales – is a reliable supply of healthy, local and affordable food, with the useful by-product of greater understanding of food and nutrition. And the sheer satisfaction of eating food grown yourself or in your community must be good for body and soul!

Jill Evans MEP is deputy president of Plaid Cymru and represents the whole of Wales in the European Parliament where she is a member of the Environment Committee