While the essential role of farmers in feeding our nation has received more recognition in the past two months than for generations, seismic changes to our food supply chains caused by coronavirus continue to huge downwards pressure on farmgate prices, particularly for some dairy farmers, but also for beef and lamb producers, writes Bryn Francis, Montgomeryshire chairman of the FUW.

The FUW continues to attend virtual meetings about the crisis on an almost daily basis with officials from both the Welsh and UK Governments as well as with numerous other bodies, and has continuously called for a range of support to protect those businesses hit hard by the pandemic.

Last week the EU opened Private Storage Aid for a range of agricultural products, and under the Brexit Withdrawal Agreement the UK is eligible for such aid.

This was one of the options put forward by the FUW some seven weeks ago, but is on its own a drop in the ocean that must complement a range of other interventions to support food producers.

In England, Defra last week announced a dairy hardship fund to help those dairy farmers facing devastating financial losses as a result of the fall in prices, allowing English farmers to access up to each, to cover 70% of lost income during April and May.

Even though losses on many farms would far exceed the support that has been announced, given that farms are not eligible for many of the key support packages offered to date by Governments, this comes as a welcome lifeline for English farmers.

With large numbers of Welsh dairy farmers also facing financial catastrophe, the FUW has called on the Welsh Government to follow Defra’s lead, and it is really hoped that by the time this column goes to print we will have had a positive response from the Welsh Government.

As in the dairy sector, Government interventions will also be needed for our beef and lamb sectors if those markets cannot be turned around, particularly as we go into the main season for lamb sales in the summer and autumn.

And as the FUW recently told the Westminster Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee, in the longer term our governments must take the pandemic as a stark warning not to follow policies which undermine our family farms, and food production and security.

The panic buying in early March gave us a small taste of what food shortages really look like, but in countries reliant on food imports the impacts of the pandemic are far more acute.

Our leaders need to urgently revise current plans to import more food while further decoupling rural support from food production, active farmers and family farms – plans which would further expose our population to food shortages in the event of a future pandemic or emergency.