44 per cent of its normal<\/a> rainfall in March, April and May and 71 per cent so far in June. And these problems will deepen if new areas go into drought.<\/p>\nThis could put pressure on food supplies that may, in turn, push up prices and reduce the variety of local produce on offer in the supermarkets, retailers warn.<\/p>\n
\u201cReduced yields from poor UK harvests would likely put pressure on food prices and will increase reliance on imports to ensure availability for customers,\u201d Andrew Opie, Director of Food & Sustainability at the British Retail Consortium told The i Paper.<\/p>\n
\u201cFood inflation has been trending upwards in recent months and is likely to rise further as retailers and their suppliers must contend with increased regulatory costs, geopolitical tensions and the impact of climate change,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Experts point out that prices on crops such as wheat and barley tend to be set globally and so are less likely to be affected by poor growing conditions in the UK \u2013 although they say even those might come under pressure, especially if Iran was to carry out its threat of shutting the Strait of Hormuz, a major trade route.<\/p>\n
But the prices of fruit and veg are typically much more dependent on local growing conditions and are therefore more likely to be affected, they argue.<\/p>\n
Asked whether we might see food shortages or price rises as a result of a significant drought, Rachel Hallos, a South Pennines beef and sheep farmer and vice president of the National Farmers Union, told The i Paper: \u201cIt literally depends on whether they can get it from elsewhere and that geopolitical climate that we\u2019re in. If something goes wrong in Iran again and those shipping straits get blocked, we\u2019ve got problems. We\u2019re on that knife edge\u201d.<\/p>\n
Mark Robson, a farmer in Northumberland, added: \u201cOur wheat looks absolutely appalling.<\/p>\n
\u201cLast year, trying to get it in, it was wet and then we had lots of flooding. Then it was pretty cold and from the cold, it was very very dry. And from the end of October, we had very little rainfall to keep the crops growing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Steve Moncaster, technical advisor for Norfolk Environment Food and Farming, which helps about half of Norfolk\u2019s farmers manage their irrigation supplies, said: \u201cIf July is very dry, then there is definitely a risk to crops that are currently being grown and it will affect yield and quality.\u201d<\/p>\n
Reservoirs depleted \u2013 and hosepipe bans loom<\/p>\n
Yorkshire Water, which is already operating in a drought, said its reservoirs are currently 58.3 per cent full, compared with an average of 81.9 per cent for this time of year.<\/p>\n
Dave Kaye, director of water at Yorkshire Water, said there was the prospect of a hosepipe ban if the drought continues and urged people to cut their water use.<\/p>\n
\u201cWithout significant rainfall in the coming months, temporary usage restrictions are a possibility. It\u2019s important customers continue with their own efforts to use water wisely to help protect water resources into the summer months,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Forecasting the rain with any degree of accuracy is extremely difficult due to the complexity of the weather system, so it\u2019s unclear how long the hot, dry weather will persist \u2013 and whether rainfall in the coming weeks will be enough to avert the threat of the drought spreading.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is a higher-than-average chance of a hot period over summer,\u201d said Met Office spokesman Grahame Madge.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have already seen one in June, with another one on the way for the end of the month. Taking the UK as a whole near-average rainfall is most likely,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Farmers fear a shortage of potatoes, wheat and carrots as a result of the prolonged dry weather –…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":222880,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3843],"tags":[46000,728,2461,70,16,15,741],"class_list":{"0":"post-222879","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-environment","8":"tag-drought","9":"tag-environment","10":"tag-heatwave","11":"tag-science","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom","14":"tag-weather"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222879","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=222879"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222879\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/222880"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=222879"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=222879"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=222879"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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