£828M losses for farmers for 2025 harvest, with hottest spring and summer on record in the UK (ECIU)

With the hottest spring and summer on record in the UK, and the driest spring in England for over 100 years, farmers who cultivate wheat, barley, oats and oilseed rape have experienced one the poorest harvest ever recorded: this is the main conclusion of a report published by the British Economy and Climate Intelligence Unit (ECIU), on 03/12/2025. Three of the four worst harvests in the last century in the UK took place after 2020, according to ECIU data.

For year 2025, "Using harvest estimates and prices, we estimate that farmers are set to lose approximately £828m in revenue when selling at current ex-farm prices, compared to if production volumes had been at the 10-year average (between 2015-2024), as reported by Total Income from Farming (TIFF) data. This is 20% less. This year’s anticipated poor harvest comes following one of the worst harvest on record in 2024, following extreme autumn and winter rainfall in 2023/24. Lost production in 2024 was partly offset by high prices, which remained elevated following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine driving up commodity prices in 2022-24"…