The great British food shortage: Why your weekly shop is about to get worse

Independent

20-02-2025

Once upon a time, a trip to the supermarket was routine. You went in, picked up what you needed, paid and left – probably moaning about the price of cheese, but still confident that cheese would be there. Now? Not so much. Butter's on the endangered list, broccoli has gone into hiding and good luck finding a bottle of orange juice that doesn't cost the same as a pint in Soho.
Shelves are bare. Prices are soaring. Food is turning into a luxury rather than a given. But this isn't some fleeting post-pandemic blip. This is the future. And unless serious action is taken, Britain is staring down the barrel of a food security crisis that will make the Brexit -fuelled tomato shortage look like a minor inconvenience.
The weather's not helping, obviously
If you've been outside at any point in the last year, you'll have noticed that it's mostly rained. This is bad news for farmers. Last year, England suffered its second-worst harvest on record, with farmers losing crops to relentless downpours and cold snaps. At Sandridge Barton, a vineyard in Devon, grape production plummeted by 70 per cent – which is a big problem when your entire business model revolves around, well, grapes.
It's the same for wheat farmers. Their losses mean flour is in short supply, which means bread is more expensive, which means your morning toast just got a little less affordable. Meanwhile, broccoli and cauliflower – normally in abundance by this point in the year – are missing, thanks to a disastrous growing season in Spain and Italy. These are two countries Britain relies on for fresh veg, and this year, unseasonal cold and rain mean they've simply got less to send.
The result? Supermarkets are struggling to stock even basic greens. If you do find broccoli, you'll probably pay more for it. And if you don't? Time to get used to life without it.
But while the climate crisis is making growing conditions more volatile, Luke King, supply and technical director at organic veg box company Riverford, argues that the problem runs deeper. 'Yes, extreme weather is making growing conditions more unpredictable, but the industrial food system is at the heart of the problem,' he explains. 'We need a whole-system shift – one that values the true cost of producing good food and supports the farmers who work with nature, not against it.'
Without fundamental change, these shortages will only become more frequent – and it's not just consumers who will suffer. Farms can't survive on razor-thin margins forever. If we don't start prioritising resilience over short-term profit, the real crisis will be when there aren't enough British farms left to grow our food at all.
Hannah Brinsden, head of policy at the Food Foundation, meanwhile, says this is just one part of the bigger picture. 'As outlined by the government's Food Security Report published last year, geopolitics, climate change and Brexit are all impacting our national food security,' she explains. 'Meanwhile, cost of living and food inflation have contributed to a higher cost of food, widespread food insecurity and healthy diets being out of reach for many.'
Imports can't save us
Despite companies like Riverford championing home-grown produce, Britain isn't exactly self-sufficient when it comes to food, which means that when things go wrong elsewhere, we really feel it. The citrus harvest in Florida and Brazil has collapsed thanks to disease and extreme weather, meaning there's barely enough orange juice to go around. Innocent and Tropicana – two of the biggest names in juice – have been rationing supply. If you've noticed fewer cartons on the shelves, now you know why.
It's the same story across the board. A global aluminium shortage has made it harder to produce cans, meaning beer is in shorter supply. Meanwhile, coffee and cocoa prices have doubled, thanks to extreme weather ruining crops in key growing regions. Your morning flat white and the bar of chocolate you reach for when the day turns to hell? Both are about to get significantly more expensive.
Even basic cooking essentials are feeling the squeeze. Sunflower oil is becoming harder to source, butter prices are climbing and beef isn't far behind. The simple truth is this: as the climate crisis intensifies, food is only going to get harder to produce.
Brexit, strikes and the case of the vanishing workers
You can't produce food without workers, and Britain no longer has enough of them. Brexit saw an exodus of agricultural workers, and those who remain aren't exactly being incentivised to stay. The result? Arla, the UK's biggest dairy supplier, has warned that farmers are cutting herd sizes, which is why butter is getting more expensive. Meanwhile, a strike at Bakkavor's Spalding plant – the company that makes dips, soups and pasta sauces for most major supermarkets – caused a Christmas shortage of party food.
This is the state of things now: a single factory strike is enough to send an entire category of products into freefall. The supply chain is that fragile.
And then there's the question of trade. The US has been floating tariffs as high as 24 per cent on certain imported foods, which, if implemented, will push prices even higher. The cost of living is already at breaking point. If food prices keep rising, who knows what will happen next?
This is now a crisis
Food inflation in Britain has hit a 45-year high. And there's no relief in sight.
'Food prices have increased by about 26 per cent over the past three years, and our food insecurity survey found that 13.6 per cent of households were food insecure in June 2024, rising to 18 per cent in households with children,' says Brinsden.
Supermarkets are trying to soften the blow by shrinkflation – giving you less product for the same price – but shoppers aren't stupid. They know a smaller packet of pasta when they see one. 'For decades, supermarkets have pushed down prices while giving customers the illusion of 'cheap food',' says King. 'The reality is that these costs don't disappear – they show up elsewhere, whether in poor wages for farm workers, declining food quality or damage to our environment.'
He says this is often hidden by what he calls 'farmwashing' – 'where supermarket branding creates the illusion of small, family-run farms, despite food often being produced on an industrial scale with little transparency on environmental and ethical practices. This lack of transparency disconnects people from the reality of where their food comes from, and many smaller farms are being pushed to the brink.'
As stocks fall and prices rise, on the other end of the spectrum food banks are seeing record demand, with families struggling to afford even basic essentials. 'What continues to be our biggest concern is ensuring we have enough food to meet the ever-growing demand for food support,' says Richard Smith, head of food supply at The Felix Project, a charity that saves surplus food and redistributes it to charities. 'Higher food prices mean more people are forced to turn to food banks for help and sadly they are buckling under the pressure.'
There are growing fears that food shortages could lead to unrest.
Sounds dramatic, but look at history. When food gets too expensive, people don't just sit around moaning about it. They protest. They riot. There's a reason the phrase 'bread and circuses' exists – when a government can't keep its people fed, things get messy.
What can actually be done?
The government has pledged £5bn to support British farmers, but most in the industry say it's nowhere near enough. Industry leaders are calling for urgent intervention, warning that the UK needs a coherent food security strategy before things get worse.
One fix is bringing back seasonal worker visas, so British farms can actually, you know, grow food. Another is encouraging homegrown alternatives to imports, like the new wave of British-made pasta brands, which are helping fill the gap left by pricier Italian imports. There's also growing interest in vertical farming, where food is grown indoors under artificial light – a potential game-changer for fresh produce.
Some experts are even suggesting a return to wartime-style subsidised canteens, where people can get a proper meal at a fair price. Churchill set up the National Restaurant Service in the 1940s for exactly this reason – so why not now?
'There's no one solution,' says Brinsden, 'but it's absolutely vital that the government takes action if it wants to meet its goals on reducing mass dependency on food parcels and supporting the healthiest generation ever.' She says this ranges from supporting our farmers in the UK and reducing reliance on countries at the highest risk of climate shocks, to boosting consumers' access to affordable, healthier foods and supporting free school meal programmes to support low-income households.
King agrees; he's firmly in the British farmers' corner, demanding 'fairer pricing, greater transparency and stronger support for sustainable farming. If we want a resilient food system, we must start by choosing to support the farms and food businesses that are building one.'
Right now, food shortages feel like a temporary inconvenience. A mild irritation. A thing you complain about in the supermarket queue. But it's time to start seeing them for what they really are: a warning.
Climate change isn't going anywhere. Worker shortages aren't getting better. And as long as Britain is over-reliant on imports, it will remain dangerously vulnerable to global food supply shocks.
There is still time to act. But if Britain waits too long, those half-empty shelves might just become the full-time reality.