UK food and drink export volumes have fallen to their third lowest level this millennium, while imports have climbed to their second highest on record — pushing the country’s food and drink trade deficit to £21.1bn, the largest since 2000.

The figures, published in the Food and Drink Federation’s (FDF) latest Trade Snapshot, show export volumes down 11.7% in the first half of 2026 compared with H1 2025. At 4bn kg, exports were only marginally above levels seen at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic and in the aftermath of the 2001 foot and mouth disease outbreak.

Imports, meanwhile, reached 19.1bn kg — second only to H1 2025 — despite global conflict disrupting trade flows elsewhere.

Exports squeezed on all sides

The picture is bleak across both of the UK’s major export markets. Sales to the EU fell 0.9% in value terms, with declines to the UK’s top two destinations, Ireland (-4.9%) and France (-4.6%), which the FDF attributes to the additional costs and complexity of trading with the bloc since Brexit, compounded by inconsistent application of rules across member states.

Non-EU exports fared worse, dropping 6.9% in value terms. Exports to the UAE fell by nearly a quarter (23.4%), driven in part by the ongoing war with Iran disrupting trade to the Middle East. The US’s 10% tariff also took its toll, with exports to the country down 16.5% — a decline the FDF expects to deepen as the latest round of US tariffs leaves EU producers better positioned than their UK counterparts.

A widening trade gap

On the import side, volumes from outside the EU are up 22% compared with H1 2023, following the government’s easing of import controls from the rest of the world. The FDF points to a domestic business environment under strain, citing a CBI report that put the burden of taxes and packaging regulation on food and drink manufacturers at nearly £10bn in 2025 — equivalent to 23.8% of the sector’s GVA.

The FDF is urging government to act by simplifying regulation, ensuring tariff suspensions strengthen domestic manufacturing rather than benefiting overseas competitors, helping businesses make full use of existing UK free trade agreements, and securing a UK-EU SPS agreement that levels the playing field for UK exporters. It also wants tariffs reduced on key ingredients rather than packaged products, to lower production costs for UK manufacturers, and adequate time for businesses to adapt as talks with the EU on the future trade relationship continue.

Karen Betts, chief executive of the FDF, said: “Our food and drink trade deficit is growing and is now the largest it’s been in over 25 years. In a world beset by conflict and the ever-increasing impacts of climate change, this poses some stark questions about our food security.

“The pressures on manufacturers are significant and growing, with the cost of everything they need to make food going up, from energy and ingredients, to logistics, packaging and labour. Constantly changing regulation and high compliance costs are adding to this and making UK businesses uncompetitive both here and abroad.

“When the government then chooses to remove tariffs on, for example, biscuits imported from China, it’s not surprising that they’ll be sold more cheaply here than biscuits made in the UK using British ingredients. But this is putting British products and British jobs at risk.”

Betts added that, as the sector heads to Liverpool this weekend, the FDF is calling on Andy Burnham and his government to act on the evidence and work in partnership with the industry so that producers “from farmers to the manufacturers who buy from them” can run viable businesses across the UK.

Farmers echo the warning

The NFU has also responded to the figures. Tom Bradshaw, president of the NFU, said: “These figures should be a wake-up call. At a time of growing geopolitical uncertainty, we cannot afford to take our food production capacity for granted.

“The pressures facing farm businesses are immense, from rising costs and regulatory burdens to extreme weather and global market volatility. If government is serious about food security, economic growth and national resilience, it must create the conditions that give businesses the confidence to invest, innovate and grow.

“A strong food manufacturing sector depends on a strong farming sector. This widening food trade deficit underlines the need for a clear, long-term plan that backs British production and recognises a simple truth that food security is national security.”

Structural shift?

The scale of the deficit — the largest in a quarter of a century — underscores a structural shift rather than a one-off dip. With EU exports weighed down by post-Brexit friction and non-EU markets hit by tariffs and geopolitical disruption, UK producers are losing ground abroad at the same time as import volumes are rising at home. Both the FDF and NFU frame this as a food security question as much as a trade one, and their shared call is for government to treat domestic manufacturing competitiveness — on regulation, tariffs and trade agreements — as inseparable from the strength of UK farming.