Food, farming and agriculture In this feature trading standards UK economy food-chain protection Down on the farm From Avian Influenza Orders to the Zoonoses Regulations, trading standards enforce and advise on dozens of laws concerning livestock and a farming industry that is essential to our economy, as these latest figures show SOURCE: BRITISH FOOD AND FARMING AT A GLANCE, DEPARTMENT FOR ENVIRONMENT, FOOD AND RURAL AFFAIRS. FIGURES RELATE TO 2014 25.8bn The value of agricultural production to the UK economy. In volume terms, thats 14.6bn litres of milk from 1.8m cows 17.2m ha* ( 71%) of land 400,000 970m jobs dozen eggs laid by 37.1m birds Trading standards interventions help control disease outbreaks among animals and prevent diseased animals from entering the human food chain. In 2014 the UK produced 2.6bn beef and veal 1.1bn 1.3bn mutton and lamb pork 2.3bn poultry 18.7bn and UK households spent on meat 6.23** 11.4bn on milk, cheese and eggs 2.93** Agriculture, food and drink manufacturing, wholesaling, retail and catering combined make the food and farming sector worth 108bn to the UK economy 26.9bn of which comes from food and drink manufacturing larger than car and aerospace manufacturing combined Credits Images: Sentavio / tele52 / dimair / RBZst / Shutterstock * Hectare, equal to 10,000m2 **Average spend per person per week To share this page, in the toolbar click on You might also like Fraud barometer March 2016