Letter sent to The Times by the NFU (National Farmers' Union) , following an inaccurate article of the newspaper on biofuels:
Sir
Robin Pagnamenta's article (Hunger for biofuels will gobble up wheat surplus, The Times, October 5) must be put into context.
Despite this year's wheat production being lower than in 2008, UK
stocks are at double the levels of the five-year average - five million
tonnes against the five-year average of 2.5mt. In fact, in the last ten
years we have produced near 16 million tonnes four times and 12 million
tonnes only once.
The long term prospects are positive with UK farmers able to produce
more if the correct market and policy signals are in place. The 2009
harvest reflected falling cereal markets and higher crop input costs
affecting production directly.
Biofuels are an efficient use of land producing both an important
low carbon fuel to replace fossil fuels and also a high protein
co-product that can help reduce our dependence on imported protein for
animal feeds.
NFU President Peter Kendall
Furthermore:
- Given the large carryover of stocks, UK wheat prices are likely to remain low. In addition, bumper harvests in the rest of Europe are likely to ensure supply (and low prices) in the near future.
- The UK always imports wheat, including for bread, as this is part of normal trade.
- The wheat used in the wheat-to-bioethanol plant will be of the
lowest grade and will not compete with high grade milling wheat, as the
one used for bread.
- UK wheat is now the cheapest in the world – giving us a potential competitive advantage to produce biofuels from this feed stock.