Written evidence submitted by Payhembury Provisions (COV0013)

 

Have the measures announced by the Government to mitigate the disruptions to the food supply chain caused by the pandemic been proportionate, effective and timely.

Payhembury Provisions is a small, rural community-run shop serving the local community and surrounding area. The nearest supermarkets are a Sainsbury’s in Ottery St Mary (4 miles away) and a Tesco in Honiton (7 miles away). There is no direct public transport link to Ottery St Mary and the bus service to Honiton is limited (and reduced during the current crisis). The shop has always been an important source of supplies to the community but has now become a lifeline for many people who are unable or unwilling to travel far to get their groceries. Home deliveries by the larger supermarkets have been difficult to arrange due to the large number of people requesting them and the local shop has, during this time, been the only source of supplies for some people. The shop is now delivering shopping direct to many people.

The shop relies on many different suppliers and seeks to promote and support local suppliers wherever possible. Many of these local suppliers have continued to keep the shop supplied with their products over the last few weeks, including staples such as bread, milk and meat. However, the bulk of products required by the shop are sourced from wholesalers, the majority of products from Booker (a subsidiary of Tesco’s since March 2018), but also some from Queenswood. The choice of available wholesalers is very limited and the few in our area are not taking on any new customers so we very restricted in where we can source our products.

On 24th March, with less than 24 hours notice, Booker phoned to change the terms of their deliveries – they would no longer deliver frozen food, would no longer give a time for delivery and required orders to be placed earlier to give themselves more time to get orders together. All of these changes have increased the pressure on the overstretched volunteers, including volunteers now making additional trips to the warehouse to pick up frozen stock (a round trip of 25 miles), volunteers having to come to the shop quickly to process “dumped” deliveries (which can now happen at any time of the day and which causes conflict with the shop policy of a maximum of 2 customers in the shop at a time) and increasing pressure on the ordering system. However, Booker has not reduced their minimum order value during this time.

An analysis of our orders to Booker between 18th March and 14th April (for non-frozen items only) has shown a rapidly increasing number of items that either can’t be ordered at all or, if ordered, are then not delivered. In the last 2 weeks we have only received ~40% of the items required (40% couldn’t be ordered and a further 20% were ordered but not delivered). We are now ordering twice as often as we did 6 weeks ago, with bigger orders each time, but with less being delivered. The main items that the shop has struggled to get over the recent 5 weeks are:

Almost all of the above have been unavailable for at least 5 weeks and the shop sold out of many of these items weeks ago. Availability from Queenswood is the same, with many items not delivered. We are working really hard to find alternative products but, in many cases, they are just not available for small rural shops. Many of the above items are available in the larger supermarkets, such as Tesco, which highlights the fact that the supply chain is not working correctly and is favouring the larger supermarkets.

From our experience, described above, we believe the measures introduced by the Government have not been sufficient to prevent problems with the food supply chain nor to put it right once problems were identified. Further, more effective measures should have been introduced earlier to ensure a more level playing field for all food retailers and consideration should have been given to the different needs of urban and rural communities. Urban communities often have a choice of places to shop, rural ones are often limited to only one or two so it is imperative that these one or two are kept well-stocked with basic supplies.

Are the Government and food industry doing enough to support people to access sufficient healthy food; and are any groups not having their needs met? If not, what further steps should the Government and food industry take?

We are not aware of any measures being taken by the Government to support the vital role being played by many small independent and rural community shops in supplying essential basic groceries to our, often isolated, communities. We are trying to adapt and find alternative sources to support our vulnerable community, but this is down to the hard work and ingenuity of our team of dedicated and hardworking volunteers and not due to any Government initiatives. The vital work of our volunteers in enabling people to access essential supplies, in delivering to those who are isolating and in checking on the wellbeing of the vulnerable in our community is immeasurable. The needs of our rural community are not being met because of the inadequate flow of essential supplies to small community shops such as ours.

The Government should take immediate and urgent steps to ensure an adequate supply of essential basic groceries to rural retailers so that we can, in turn, make sure the vulnerable, and those in need in our communities, are fully supported.

What further impacts could the current pandemic have on the food supply chain, or individual elements of it, in the short to medium-term and what steps do industry, consumers and the Government need to take to mitigate them?

Without Government intervention we believe we will continue to be at a disadvantage in obtaining basic essential suppliers for our community shop. Individuals in the community will have to make more, and longer, journeys to supermarkets further afield to obtain their essential supplies thereby increasing the risk to themselves and the community. Volunteers will continue to have to make extra journeys to wholesalers to try to fill the gaps in the stock – again increasing the risk to everyone.

The government need to intervene to ensure that the supply and distribution of essential and basic goods is fair to all and need to take urgent action where this does not happen. Larger supermarkets are already being able to restock high demand items fairly easily where we, as a small rural shop, cannot even order them from our supplier. This inequality needs to be addressed urgently so that we can support our rural communities.

How effectively has the Government worked with businesses and NGOs to share information on disruptions to the supply chain and other problems, and to develop and implement solutions? How effectively have these actions been communicated to the public?

We are not aware of any measures by the Government to work with our business to either keep us informed of disruptions or to develop and implement solutions. The Government have not communicated directly with us as a business and have not provided us with any support at this time. Their communication with the public has been very poor. The Government message so far appears to have been limited to ‘don’t panic buy and then there will be enough for everyone’. The Government needs to communicate its intention to urgently sort the supply chain problems both to businesses and to the consumers in a clear, concise manner. The Government needs to demonstrate that all food retailers are equally important to the people they support, whether they are big or small, urban or rural, they need to do that urgently and they need to communicate that clearly and widely.

April 2020