An increase of 17% in lamb imports last year, according to 2022 UK trade data, and the months of September through to November recording abnormally high levels of frozen New Zealand product entering the UK (HCC figures), should serve as a stark warning to the UK Government, the Farmers’ Union of Wales (FUW) has said.
Ministers, MPs and Lords who were supportive of the UK Government's liberal approach to trade negotiations with New Zealand and Australia argued at the time that the Welsh sheep industry should not be concerned as those countries were well below the existing import quota limits and this was unlikely to change.
The FUW warned then that this was a naïve or deliberately misleading point of view that failed to take account of how global markets, exchange rates and other factors could rapidly change, leading to increases in import volumes that have a negative impact on UK markets.
The significant increase in lamb imports from New Zealand in 2022 demonstrated precisely this point, while the FUW does acknowledge that other factors were also at play in the lamb market.
The UK is now locked into trade deals with New Zealand and Australia that will phase out import limits for key Welsh products altogether, with few safeguards for domestic producers.
These deals are seen as laughably liberal by other countries given the vanishingly small benefits the Government's own figures show they are likely to bring for the UK economy.
The FUW reiterates its longstanding call for the UK Government to revise its policy on international trade and place UK food security and standards at the top of the agenda - particularly given the vulnerability of lengthy supply chains and reliance on imports exposed by the pandemic and Russia's attack on Ukraine.
The Government's own impact analyses make it clear that these deals will see production and prices undermined, with losses of hundreds of millions for the food and farming sector under certain scenarios.
Such losses would be severely compounded if similarly liberal trade deals are signed with other countries the UK is currently negotiating with and may seek trade deals with in future.