The farming industry's concerns about the dominance of supermarkets were acknowledged by Environment Secretary David Miliband yesterday as he called for fair trade "to start at home".
In a speech at the Royal Show, which started in Warwickshire yesterday, the Secretary for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs called for corporate responsibility and for farmers to receive deserved rewards.
But he also stressed the need for farmers to adopt a "one-planet philosophy" to help preserve resources and help rural communities prosper.
Mr Miliband, who took up his post just over eight weeks ago, said: "I am well aware of the strength of feeling of many in the industry about farming's relationship with super-markets, an issue to which the NFU's recent submission to the Competition Commission drew attention.
"There is no doubt that if farmers are to be equitably rewarded for what they produce for the market, the concept of fair trade has to start at home. Corporate responsibility needs to be borne by every link in the food chain, and be seen to be."
Mr Miliband said farmers were not just part of the food chain but also part of a "changing rural economy" and he could detect many farmers were feeling undervalued and unappreciated.
He said: "Farm diversification, the use of farm assets for other activities, in particular tourism, is an activity which has great potential for contributing to sustainable rural communities, not just farmer incomes.
"We can help farming regain its rightful place as a British success story that the British public is proud to acclaim.
"I believe the way forward to meeting these challenges is through a shared agenda and sense of purpose for farming, which both Government and farmers take responsibility for delivering."
Tackling some of the world's biggest environmental challenges and delivering prosperity at home required a "shared agenda for farming".
"Our goal should be to build a profitable, innovative and competitive industry, which helps build sustainable rural communities, while making a positive net contribution to the environment and managing risks, especially of animal dis-ease," he said.
"A one-planet philosophy must be at the heart of a new partnership between farming and Government.
"We are living as if we had three planets' worth of resources to live with rather than just one. We need to cut by about two-thirds of our ecological footprint.
"For that we need oneplanet farming as well as one-planet living.
"One-planet farming will minimise the impact on the environment of food production and consumption and which maximises its contribution to renewal of the natural environment."
NFU president Peter Kendall said the one-planet farming concept was very promising but problems would need to be addressed.
He said: "The big problem with one-planet farming is how we look at this whole challenge and what we do environmentally and what our goals are. Half the concern is we export large levels of products and methane levels increase elsewhere."
Addressing Mr Miliband, he said: "Thank you for the ideas of moving forward but it seems a long way off. If you are going to find a way of bringing our whole industry forward, let us invest in smart solutions."
Fiona Reynolds, the National Trust's director general, said she welcomed Mr Miliband's proposals. "We all know how much of a change farming is going through. I welcome your evaluation of these problems," she said. ..SUPL:
