Meeting of the Parliament 25 March 2026 [Draft]
As other members have done, Michelle Thomson has raised a number of important points. We established a food security unit precisely to address the key challenges that members have identified. That unit was initially set up on the back of the work of the food sector resilience group that was established when the outbreak of war in Ukraine led to significant shortages. We in Scotland are fortunate to have close engagement with our wider food and drink sector, which means that we can engage quickly in an effort to address some of the challenges and find ways through them. We set up the food security unit in order to monitor the situation.
With regard to broader engagement, I met NFU Scotland just last week, on the back of its letter to the Prime Minister about the significant concerns and issues that it wanted to be addressed. As the agriculture minister has just highlighted in response to Willie Rennie, and as I said in my meeting with the NFUS, we want to work with the industry to address those challenges. We are seeking engagement with the UK Government on the matter, so that we can address some of the problems and get ahead of any further issues.