ABSTRACT
European agriculture and its farmers, production horticulture and its growers are currently facing many pressures: climate change, reduced resource availability, responsibilities to protect the environment, volatile prices and ever-moving political agendas. Whilst farms provide both goods and services, an immediate issue for the future is guaranteeing food supplies in an ever more uncertain world, thus, the ability of Europe to feed itself is becoming ever more important (Candel, et al., 2014). In the UK self-sufficiency has already been reviewed (Lee, 2015) and shown to vary for fresh produce, from 8-50 per cent for fruit and vegetables, respectively. Whilst some commodities such as wheat are abundantly produced in the UK, overall self-sufficiency is lacking, even though UK farmers currently manage relatively larger scale and more intensive farming systems than for most of Europe (Kempen, et al., 2011). Whilst economies of scale have been established for larger farms (Gadanakis, et al., 2015a) (Keizer & Emvalomatis, 2014) there is a continuing interest in smaller, localized food production (Kirwan & Maye, 2013). This chapter attempts to evaluate the potential future role of small-scale entrepreneurship for a more food secure UK as we face an ever more uncertain future.
