PDF file: Annual Report 2002/2003 - Scottish Crop Research Institute

Director’s Report
tats, most notably when setting planning and development
policies. (f) The Council (EC) Regulation on
the Protection of Species of Wild Fauna and Flora by
Regulating Trade Therein, which came into force in
the UK in June 1997, standardising wildlife trade regulations
across the EU, and protecting around 30,000
plant and animal species, many of which are relevant
to agricultural habitats. (g) Finally, within the UK,
the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 gives legal
protection to specified wild plants and animals, lays
down a close season for wild birds, and details penalties
for persons found guilty of an offence under the
Act.
UK Agriculture
Overview The publication Agriculture in the United
Kingdom 2002 is the fifteenth in a much-consulted,
highly regarded, and authoritative series which succeeded
the Annual Review of Agriculture. Produced by
the Department for Environment, Food and Rural
Affairs (Defra), the Scottish Executive Environment
and Rural Affairs Department, the Department of
Agriculture and Rural Development (Northern
Ireland), and the National Assembly for Wales
Agriculture and Rural Affairs Department, it relates to
a massive compendium of data on the Defra website,
particularly at ‘Economics/Statistics’ under
‘Publications’ (www.defra.gov.uk/esg/m_publications.htm).
Related websites are listed on p128 of
Agriculture in the United Kingdom 2002.
FMD No new cases of Foot-and-Mouth Disease
(FMD) were recorded in 2002, following the most
severe outbreak of the disease since 1967-1968, an
event that drastically affected the rural economy of the
UK during 2001. For the purposes of international
trade in animals and animal products, the UK
regained its status as an FMD-free country in January
2002, but the reputation of the UK in this regard had
been severely blighted, not least as the FMD outbreak
came soon after the prolonged and damaging occurrence
of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE).
As debate continued as to the handling, cost and legality
of the official pre-emptive slaughter policy, three
inquiries were launched during this disease outbreak;
from these inquiries came three important reports.
The first was Farming and Food: A Sustainable Future
produced by the Policy Commission on the Future of
Farming and Food in January 2002, which led to
three papers produced by government in December
2002: The Strategy for Sustainable Farming and Food –
Facing the Future; Response to the Report of the Policy
Commission on the Future of Farming and Food by HM
Government; and Farming and Food’s Contribution to
Sustainable Development – Economic and Statistical
Analysis. The other two reports were a scientific
report by the Royal Society on the transmission, prevention,
and control of epidemic outbreaks of infectious
diseases in livestock, and Foot and Mouth
Disease: Lessons to be Learned Inquiry Report. In
November 2002, the Government responded with its
Response to the Reports of the Foot and Mouth Disease
Inquiries. A consequence of livestock disease outbreaks
was the bureaucratic effort put into the identification
tagging, registration and recording of
movements of livestock.
Economic Contribution Provisional data in the calendar
year 2002 edition indicated that the contribution
of agriculture to the total UK economy gross value
added (GVA) as a percentage of total GVA at current
prices was similar to that of 2001 (revised) at 0.8%,
contrasting with an average of 1.5% during 1991-
1993, or 1.0% in 1998. At current prices, the GVA
in 2002 equated to £7.117 billion compared with an
upwardly revised figure of £6.850 billion for 2001,
but caution is needed because GVA measurements are
prone to rapid changes with sharp movements in
commodity prices. It is to be stressed that many of
the figures given for previous years have been revised
in the light of changes in the scope and nature of the
data and improvements in statistical methods.
Agriculture is said to be about one tenth the size of
tourism, but tourism is in part dependent on agriculture.
Using the revised basis for calculating the workforce
in agriculture that includes sponsors of farmers,
partners and directors, as well as those on work-related
government training schemes, about 1.9% of the
total workforce was employed in agriculture
(550,000), compared with 2.4% (637,000) during
1991-1993. About 50% of the workforce was parttime.
As before, the data do not take into account the
large portion of the UK workforce that is involved
with upstream and downstream activities directly
dependent on agriculture, ranging from parts of the
public sector (staff in government departments and
their agencies and institutes, Research Councils and
their institutes, higher-education and further-education
bodies, various EU-related groups) to several
parts of commerce and the private sector (food processing,
storage, distribution, and retail; the industrial
feedstock industry; restaurants, hotels, and the tourist
trade). For comparison, the EU Farm Structure
Survey carried out in 1999/2000 and reported in
2003, showed that around 75% of the 13.5 million
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