Food and Drinks industry launches major report on key opportunities in the food chain

Business in the Community and leading companies in the food industry today launched a landmark report, Plough to Plate.  This research is the first comparative study into the perceptions and priorities of consumers, food producers and those people who help to shape opinion on food production, diet and safety.

There has never been a time in history where there has been such a wide range of high quality, safe and relatively low-cost food available to UK consumers. 

But this positive development has gone hand in hand with increased complexity in the food supply chain and increased distance between those who produce food and those who consume it. 

On diet and health the public policy concerns have moved from the problem of people not having enough food to having too much of the wrong food.  Ethical and environmental issues are increasingly important and food scares have undermined public confidence. 

The Plough to Plate research is a genuine effort to shed light on an area of public debate too often characterised by heat and the negative perception that the main interest groups in the food supply chain - farmers, food producers, retailers and consumers – are more or less in a permanent state of opposition.

 There is a knowledge bank of 56 case studies of best practice available - Case studies - categorsied with the key words rural action and marketplace