'Brutal' harvest could be worst on record - here's what it means for UK's food production

England, famously described two centuries ago as a "green and pleasant land" by the poet William Blake, is today a sickly yellow after a dire lack of rain.

The weather has been so dry that Britain is now on track for one of its worst cereal and oilseed harvests on record, according to new analysis by the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit (ECIU) think tank.

It comes as Wales and England reel from their driest July in at least 190 years, forcing all the former and half the latter into drought.

Total output for barley, oats, and oilseed rape - key ingredients used in bread, beer, breakfast cereals, and livestock feed - is projected to drop to just 19.5 million tonnes this year.

That would undercut the previous low of 19.8m tonnes in 2020, making it the poorest yield since detailed record-keeping began in 1984.

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The slump is expected to cost arable farmers up to £390m in lost revenue, though it is forecast to be offset somewhat by a good year for oilseed rape.

Even if late yields outperform expectations, the ECIU warns that the final figure would still rank among the five worst harvests in history.

Tom Lancaster, of the ECIU, said the dry and hot summer, exacerbated by climate change, has left farmers "facing down the barrel of a third awful harvest in a row".

He told Sky News: "It doesn't have to be this way. Reducing emissions to net-zero would bring the climate back into balance."

Wheat, Britain's main arable crop by far and a staple on most farms, has in particular suffered from the lack of rain.

Desperate to salvage what they can, many farmers have harvested weeks early, gathering grain that is in some cases half its normal size.

Provisional estimates from the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board (AHDB) put average wheat yields so far this year at just 6.8 tonnes per hectare, down significantly from the 10-year average of 7.9 tonnes.

'Completely brutal'

Martin Lines, chief executive of the Nature Friendly Farming Network and a farmer in Cambridgeshire, warned that there was "only so much you can do to adapt to these sorts of extremes".

He said the harvest this year had been "a real kick in the teeth".

"Even farmers I know who were sceptical of climate change are now saying they're really worried about the future of their businesses and production, it's just been completely brutal for our industry," he added.

And with high input costs because of the Iran war, he said planning crops for next year was "a total nightmare".

Warnings over security

The worsening agricultural picture has sparked urgent calls to factor food production into current efforts to boost Britain's national security - not least because the UK currently imports 40% of its food.

Ed Arnold, of the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) defence think tank, said Britain should ramp up food production "while it's not an exercise".

"If you have war on the European continent, it might disrupt import supplies for six months. There's not much faith the country is looking at this seriously."

Laurie Laybourn, executive director of the Strategic Climate Risks Initiative, told Sky News: "More than any hostile nation, it has been extreme weather, supercharged by climate change, that has brought some of the biggest impacts on national security in recent years."

As Downing Street pledges to boost military spending, Mr Laybourn warned that Britain's ability to defend itself abroad "is utterly dependent on the resilience of its society at home".

(c) Sky News 2026: 'Brutal' harvest could be worst on record - here's what it means for UK's food production