Feeding Britain in the Second World War was a challenge for the wartime government of the United Kingdom. Seventy percent of British food was imported and German submarine attacks on merchant ships reduced and threatened to eliminate the supply of imported food, which would have starved much of the British population. The government worked to increase domestic production of food, especially potatoes and wheat, the most important foods during the war. Millions of acres of grassland and pasture were brought under cultivation. "British agriculture was transformed from a predominately pastoral system of low input, low output farming to a 'national farm' dominated by intensive arable farming [and] heavily dependent on inputs such as fertilizers and machinery acquired from outside the agricultural sector." The British Agricultural History Society concluded that the Second World War "established the birth of modern agriculture [in Britain] and that this transformation was the result of government policies." However, critics denounced abuses of the dictatorial powers that government-created committees and organisations had over farms and farmers.
British food imports fell from 22 million tons annually before the war to 12 million tons at the end of the war, thanks to greater domestic production of food, concentration and dehydration of some foods such as meat, milk, and eggs, and rationing, especially of imported and luxury items.
Adequate nutrition was maintained by rationing. Complaints were widespread about the dullness of the British wartime diet, focused as it was on bread and potatoes. Although the rich continued to get better food through the black market and other mechanisms, the restrictions on diet imposed by the government and shortages of many foods resulted in a "levelling-down" of rich people's diets and a "levelling-up" of the diets of the lower classes, whose nutrition before the war had been poor.
Before the war Before the onset of the Second World War in Europe in September 1939, there were 350,000 farms in England and Wales and they averaged less than in size. About 80,000 were owned or rented by part-time farmers, deriving some or most of their income from non-farm sources. Crop yields were only marginally better than they had been 50 years earlier. Chapter 2 of The Front Line of Freedom: State-led Agricultural Revolution in Britain, 1939-1945.
Britain was vulnerable to food shortages—and starvation—if Nazi Germany succeeded in preventing imports of food by submarine attacks on merchant vessels. "70 percent of cheese and sugar, nearly 80 percent of fruit, 90 percent of cereals and fats, and around fifty percent of all meat" was imported by Britain. Even British livestock was largely dependent on imported fodder. Much potentially arable land was devoted to pasture for grazing animals. Liquid milk was the only agricultural product in which the United Kingdom was self sufficient. The reliance on imported food and low prices for British crops resulted in the poor state of British agriculture in the 1930s. Compared to 1914, two million fewer acres (800,000 ha) were under cultivation, pastures were neglected and overgrown, and the number of farm workers had declined by 25 percent. Farm workers had left the land in large numbers to migrate to the cities.
In 1936, recognising Britain's vulnerability in food, the government began planning for food and agriculture in the event of war. The government planned to control the food system including domestic production, imports, rationing, and distribution and controls on consumption. To produce more food, in April 1939, the government devised a plan to pay farmers two pounds sterling per acre (0.4 ha) to plough up pasture and convert the land into cultivated cropland.
The poor state of British agriculture was matched by the poor nutrition and diet of many British people in the 1930s. "The country was marked by deep regional and class inequalities...The wealthy were consuming the lion's share of the nation's meat, fish, butter, cheese, fruit, and vegetables, while the bottom third of the nation were scraping along on a thoroughly un-nutritious diet of cheap white bread, margarine, jam, a little bacon and copious quantities of tea." While the British had a diet of sufficient calories, one-third of the population lacked access, due mostly to poverty, to more expensive "protective" foods such as milk, fruit, and vegetables.
On 24 August 1939 with war looming, the British government enacted the Emergency Powers (Defence) Act 1939 (2 & 3 Geo. 6. c. 62). The act gave the Minister of Agriculture sweeping powers to control food production and to take possession of farmland. After the outbreak of World War II in Europe in September 1939, the Ministry of Food was created and the government took on the task of ensuring that citizens had access to adequate nutrition.
Agriculture during the war
In 1939, of land in Britain was cultivated and of land was in grassland. By 1944, were being cultivated and were in grassland. The acreage planted in potatoes had more than doubled and that in wheat increased by two-thirds. The government programs to effect this change involved the "plough-up" program, guaranteed high prices to farmers for their products, and technological advances in farming practices. As much of the new land was marginal in quality, the results did not make Britain self sufficient in food. At the beginning of the war Britain produced 33 percent of the calories its people consumed; by the end of the war Britain produced 44 percent of the calories consumed.
Farming had to compete with the military for land. The military forces requisitioned of land and had the right to enter and use more than additional acres in England and Wales. The Ministry of Agriculture and the War Department often clashed over the military's claims to agricultural land.
Plough-up The Ministry of Agriculture's first priority was to bring more land into cultivation by converting grazing and unused land to crop land. Stimulated by the government's subsidy of two pounds sterling for every acre ploughed, British farmers converted in 1939–1940; 2 million more in 1940–1941; in 1941–1942; and, with imports severely restricted by German submarine attacks on shipping, in 1942–1943. 1943 saw a hot summer and an excellent harvest.
The impact of the plough-up was twofold. First, the plough-up enabled a greater acreage to be cultivated with the priority crops of agricultural policy: potatoes, wheat, barley, and oats. Potatoes were important because they were more productive per acre than almost any other crop. Wheat was important for bread, deemed essential for the morale of the population. Bread and potatoes were the staples of the British diet in the Second World War. Increases in production between 1939 and 1945 were 74.3 percent for potatoes and 90.8 percent for wheat. The Ministry of Food prioritized potato production above all other crops.
Secondly, prior to the war large quantities of fodder for livestock was imported. The plough-up reduced the acreage of pasture land, livestock numbers, and the demand for imported fodder, thereby freeing up shipping space for food imports. One acre of wheat "saved as much shipping space as seven acres of the best grass in England." The conversion of pasture to cultivated land reduced meat production. In 1943–1944, beef and veal production compared to 1939 had decreased by one-sixth; mutton and lamb by one-fifth; eggs by one-half; and pork by two-thirds. Milk production remained stable. The plough-up also resulted in better care for the quality of remaining pastures which prevented an even greater decline in production of meat and milk, albeit a shortage of quality feed as a result of reduced imports reduced the yield of milk per head of milk cow.
Labour
In 1939, the full-time agricultural labour force of Britain consisted of 546,000 men and 55,000 women. Another 111,000 people were part-time agricultural workers. By June 1944, the male full-time labour force consisted of 522,000 men and 150,000 women, including Land Girls. Although the numbers of farm workers remained about the same, agriculture production and the demand for labour increased. During harvest time, a motley crew of soldiers, the publican, the postman', school-children and even townspeople worked in the fields."
In Britain in the Second World War farm work was a reserved occupation, meaning that farmers and farm workers were not usually conscripted. With about 5 million men and women in the military and millions more in occupations servicing the military (out of a total working population of 21 million), finding additional labour for farms was difficult but necessary. Farm workers were forbidden by law from leaving their occupation and employers were forbidden from discharging them. During the war wages for farm workers rose substantially.
Land girls. Members of the Women's Land Army, called "Land Girls", augmented the numbers of farm workers during the war. They were both volunteers and conscripts, many drawn from urban areas without farming experience. They numbered more than 80,000 in 1944.
POWs and conscientious objectors. Captured Italian and German soldiers were imported into Britain and worked on farms. About 50,000 Italian prisoners of war worked on farms. Near the end of the war the Italian soldiers on the farms were joined by German POWs whose farm work continued until several years after the war. In September 1946, 180,000 German POWs were employed on farms. Britain recorded 59,192 conscientious objectors during the war of which about 20,000 were required to work on farms.
Technology At the beginning of the war most non-human labour on British farms was performed by horses. Farm horses numbered 649,000 in 1939 and still numbered 545,000 in 1945, but the increase in the use of tractors during the war was substantial. In 1939, Britain counted only 56,000 tractors; by January 1946 there were 203,000. Moreover, the government ensured that tractors were fully employed, being moved from farm to farm. Tractors were produced domestically as well as imported.
Much of the new land brought under cultivation was poor in quality, necessitating an increase in the use of fertilisers. Moreover, farmers, with their increased prosperity, could afford to buy more fertiliser. Canada assisted Britain by expanding its production of phosphates and artificial nitrogen, ingredients in fertiliser. Potash came from the Soviet Union, United States, and other countries.
The gains in British agricultural production were mostly from the cultivation of new land rather than an increase in yields because of technology. Lizzie Collingham says that productivity might even have decreased. The bumper crops of 1943 were due to good weather and the "long hours the farmers and their labourers had invested working in the fields."
Governance
In the 1930s the backwardness of British agriculture prompted calls for the nationalisation of farm land. In early 1939, prior to the beginning of the war, the Ministry of Agriculture chose instead to promote "progressive" farming techniques. When the war began, as it had in World War I, the Ministry controlled farms and farmers by the creation of county war agricultural executive committees (CWAECs), called "war ags". Forty-nine CWAECs were established in England and thirteen in Wales. Each CWAEC had eight to twelve members. Their members were influential people resident in the area for which they had responsibility. The CWAECs created hundreds of sub-committees involving more than 6,000 people to carry out their work.