UK Will Be Net Wheat Importer For 1st Time In Decade After Lousy 2012 Harvest, Endless 2013 Winter

Britain will become a net importer of wheat for the first time in a decade this year because of bad weather, the National Farmers' Union has said.

NFU president Peter Kendall said more than two million tonnes of wheat had been lost because of last year's poor summer. The prolonged cold weather would also hit this autumn's harvest, he said.

But he said the shortage was unlikely to affect the price of bread because of the global nature of the market.

Speaking on BBC Radio 4's Today programme, Mr Kendall said the average yield fell from 7.8 tonnes a hectare to 6.7 tonnes last summer. Looking ahead to the 2013 harvest, he said farmers had only managed to get three quarters of the planned wheat planted this year, so the UK was already 25% down on potential production.

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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-22050874