British Barley Harvests Devastated by Extreme Weather — Farmers Call It the "Worst in 40 Years"

Severe weather slashes barley yields across England

British barley production has suffered a sharp decline after a year of extreme and erratic weather, the BBC reports. Early government figures indicate England's 2025 barley harvest was down about 14% from 2024 overall, with spring barley yields falling roughly 23%.

Farmers around Newbury, west of London, described heavy losses on individual farms. "Probably the worst I've recorded in my career, over 40 years," said Dan Willis to the BBC. "The weather has played its part horrifically. We had an extremely wet autumn, an extremely wet winter, followed by an extremely dry spring and summer. It really did impact the yields. Something in the order of between 50 and 70% in places."

Dan Willis: "Something in the order of between 50 and 70% in places."

Economic strain for farmers and shoppers

Local farmer George Brown told the BBC that distress is visible across the region: "If you look, there's a huge amount of farm auctions, farm dispersal sales going on constantly at the moment. There's a lot of land for sale. People don't have the confidence to carry on. I absolutely want to keep farming, it gets to the point where if there's no money in it then you've got to take a change of tack." Reduced harvests risk higher prices for consumers and greater pressure on supply chains.

Global parallels and expert perspective

Similar harvest problems have been reported in parts of the United States, India, Korea, Japan and elsewhere, highlighting a global pattern of climate-related crop stress. Many climate and agricultural experts point to rising greenhouse gas emissions and broader atmospheric changes as major contributors to increased floods, heat waves and droughts that disrupt farming.

Paola Tosi, a crop scientist, told the BBC: "We need to come to terms with and tackle and make sure we are prepared to fight it. To control it, to mitigate it." She noted that research at the University of Reading dating back to 1990 warned that changing climate and weather extremes would harm crop production.

What farmers and policymakers can do

Researchers and farmers say a two-track response is needed: short-term relief and resilience measures for affected communities (emergency support, insurance, access to resilient seed varieties, irrigation and storage improvements) and long-term policies to cut emissions. At the individual level, commonly cited ways to reduce emissions include switching to electric vehicles, upgrading to heat pumps, adopting renewable energy, and shifting toward a more plant-focused diet — though such measures are part of a much larger systemic effort required to reduce global emissions.

The scale of losses in staple grains like barley raises concerns about food security, farm livelihoods and wider supply-chain impacts if extreme weather trends continue. Policymakers, industry groups and communities face pressure to combine immediate support for farmers with aggressive emissions reductions and investment in agricultural adaptation.