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A farmer's nightmare

A major worker shortage leaving UK farmers with heartbreaking choices.

The UK food industry relies on foreign workers, but what happens when they stop coming?
A combination of COVID-19 and Brexit has led to fewer workers available to pick, process and transport food. For some farmers it has led to heartbreaking dilemmas. Tamasin Ford speaks to two pig farmers who face having to kill thousands of healthy pigs, and a salad farmer who has seen millions of lettuce heads rot in his fields.

(Picture: farmer in field, Credit: Getty/BBC)

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Contributors:
Vicky Morgan, pig farmer, Pockthorpe Hall Farm, East Yorkshire, UK
Kate Morgan, pig farmer, Pockthorpe Hall Farm, East Yorkshire, UK
Nick Ottewell, Farming and Commercial Director at LJ Betts Ltd, Kent, England

Available now

27 minutes

Last on

Sun 24 Oct 202107:32GMT
BBC World Service except Europe and the Middle East

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Broadcasts

  • Thu 21 Oct 202103:32GMT
    BBC World Service except Australasia, East Asia & South Asia
  • Thu 21 Oct 202104:32GMT
    BBC World Service Australasia, South Asia & East Asia only
  • Thu 21 Oct 202110:32GMT
    BBC World Service
  • Thu 21 Oct 202121:32GMT
    BBC World Service except Europe and the Middle East
  • Thu 21 Oct 202122:32GMT
    BBC World Service Europe and the Middle East
  • Sun 24 Oct 202107:32GMT
    BBC World Service except Europe and the Middle East

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