What do you know?
Is it possible to grow your own food in the UK?
Some food grows very well in the UK. If you have a garden, you can easily grow things like tomatoes, courgettes, potatoes and onions. Most plants are seasonal, which means that you can only grow them at certain times of the year.
Key points
- Sustainable fishing involves allowing fish stocks to repopulate our seas. Sustainable meat production involves rearing animals on grass, without the use of hormones.
- Sustainable food production involves To prepare land and use it to grow crops. Farming involves cultivating fields. the land whilst also protecting it for future generations.
- Other ways to sustainably increase food supplies include organic farming, urban and peri-urban horticulture, reducing food waste, and eating food that is in season.
Game - Food sustainability
Play a Planet Planners mission and tackle the challenges of food miles as well as promoting sustainable practices.
You can also play the full game
What is sustainable fish and meat production?
Using something in a way that does not destroy it completely, for example growing food without destroying farmland or cutting down trees without destroying an entire forest. food production involves farming the land whilst also protecting it for future generations.
Fish
Sustainable fishing involves allowing fish stocks to To increase numbers of a species after they have previously declined. our seas. This means fewer fish are caught at any one time, ensuring there will be enough fish for the future.
Catching fewer fish can be achieved through a better design of fishing nets that have holes that allow smaller fish to escape. Smaller fish can then grow and repopulate the oceans.
Question
Why don’t we want to catch smaller fish?
If all fish were caught, there will be no fish left for the future. Smaller fish are often younger. If they're allowed to survive, they will grow bigger and lay their own eggs. This ensures that there will always be more fish in the sea.
Meat
Some farmers feed Crops that have been grown for food usually a cereal, eg wheat. to animals, as opposed to grass, as it increases their weight and heavier animals can be sold on for more money. This results in further The removal of trees. This is sometimes done to make land for farming, roads or settlement. in order to create the farms to grow the grain. Likewise, some cattle are given A substance that can bring about change within an organism’s body. For example, hormones can be given to cattle to encourage them to eat more and grow faster. to make them grow more quickly. Sustainable meat production involves rearing animals on grass rather than grain, without using hormones.
How else can food supplies be increased sustainably?
As well as meat and fish, various other types of food can be produced in a sustainable way.
Game - Producing food
Play a Planet Planners mission and handle agricultural issues while solving distribution problems.
You can also play the full game
Organic farming
Using natural methods to grow crops or rearing animals, eg using manure rather than chemical fertiliser. relies on natural products and processes. These include:
- natural Nutrients added to the land to make crops grow better., such as A natural fertiliser that comes from animal dung., rather than chemicals.
- using natural predators, such as ladybirds, to control Things that can damage crops. Pests include aphids and locusts. like Small insects that suck sap from plants, which causes damage. .
- Growing different crops each year. This allows the land to recover and can help control pests and diseases., which allows soils to recover
Watch this short video to learn more about organic farming
Joe: Hello Oliver, I'm Joe. Nice to meet you.
Oliver: Nice to meet you, too.
Oliver: Joe's farm produces lots of organic vegetables, but mainly carrots. He sells six million bags of them a year.
Oliver: So, how do you protect your crops without any chemicals?
Joe: We're trying to create a healthy soil. We're looking at the bacteria and the fungi that live in the soil and by not applying chemicals and by having a longer rotation, allows all of those things to thrive.
Oliver: Crop rotation involves changing what crops are grown in fields each year for a period of time to keep the soil healthy and full of all that good bacteria and fungi.
Joe: It's my belief that the more diverse your rotation is the less issues you'll have in terms of pest, disease and weed problems.
Oliver: So are pests your biggest problem here on the farm?
Joe: They are a big problem, but probably our biggest challenge is controlling weeds. If you think of a weed as being competition, weeds obviously compete for light, water, nutrition, energy.
Oliver: So, without chemicals, how do you manage to get rid of weeds? Do you have to take them out yourself, by hand?
Joe: We do, yes. But for me, organic farming and being good at organic farming means you farm preventatively, so if there's a weed in your crop and you're having to deal with it, you're kind of too late.
Oliver: Your methods are really interesting on how to farm organically. But the big question iscan you feed the entire population of the UK using organic farming?
Joe: I believe that, yes, it is possible. But if you go into a supermarket, and you pick up my bag of carrots, it'll cost you a pound. If you go into the supermarket and pick up a bag of conventional carrots, it'll cost you 60p. 50, 60p. So, essentially on the scale that we grow, we don't have, necessarily, the efficiencies that you'd have on a large scale farm.But through scale, and innovation, and forward thinking we can grow more from less, become more sustainable and essentially make what we do more affordable for more people.That's the ultimate aim. I'd like to see everybody eating organic food in the future.
Oliver: So what you're saying is your carrots taste really pretty good.
Joe: Well, why don't we try some and see what you think?
Oliver: Yep!
Joe: Down, as hard as you can.That's it. You've got it. And then pull it back.That's it. Look at all those.
Oliver: Here goes my first organic carrot, also straight from the ground.Mmm! It's really good!
Question
What is organic farming?
Organic farming relies on natural processes and products, such as the use of manure (dung and animal waste) rather than chemicals as fertilisers.
Urban and peri-urban horticulture (UPH)
Growing food in and around the edges of cities. involves growing food in and around cities. Small Relating to towns and cities; built up areas, the opposite of rural. plots produce more food than the equivalent area of farmland. Urban plots also reduce The distance that food has travelled in order to reach our plates..
Reducing food waste
It is estimated that up to a third of all food in the UK is wasted. Food that has been thrown away cannot be eaten. Less food would need to be produced if we bought less food and avoided wasting food as much as possible.
Eating seasonal foods
Importing food allows us to eat a wider variety of produce throughout the year. For example, strawberries grow in the UK during the summer months. Strawberries are imported to the UK during the winter so they can be bought in supermarkets throughout the year.
However, imported food has high food miles. In addition to this, growing food out of season in heated greenhouses or storing food generates Carbon gases that are given off by certain activities. For example, burning fossil fuels releases carbon dioxide.. Eating locally grown food that is in season, therefore, helps to reduce carbon emissions.
Test yourself
Activity: Explore sustainable food production
Play the Planet Planners game! game
Make decisions for the planet in this KS3 geography game.
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