Wettest summer means that food prices may rise

Once again, England has been plagued with an insufferably wet summer.

Not only is this frustrating for the everyday individual who wants a bit of sun and a chance to go outdoors in the summer months, it is absolutely ruining to farmers.

Continual rain has completely obliterated UK harvests, which will inevitably make the price of food increase once more.

Farmers are going to have to charge more simply to make ends meet, as their crops have done no way near as well as they had predicted and hoped.

National Farmers' Union (NFU) president, Peter Kendall, is reported as saying in The Guardian: "There are many farmers who are down 25 per cent to 30 per cent on the wheat crop. In some cases you looked from the outside and you thought, this crop will do over four tonnes to the acre – and it's been struggling to do three and some cases two tonnes to the acre."

This has been a painful and distressing thing for farmers to watch, with Mr Kendall calling it "soul-destroying for the farmers growing the crops".

Volumes of food are down significantly, not just in terms of crops.

The pig and poultry market is also at a huge loss, causing the price of those products to rise as well.

"The challenge for the pig and poultry market is trying to make sure that retailers pay a fair price, because in pigs 50% of the cost is grain, poultry it's 60% – and these farmers at the moment, because the prices haven't responded yet, they're actually saying I'm not going to fill my sheds with poultry or pigs any more," Mr Kendall said.

This may not just be a momentary thing, Mr Kendall warns. In fact, this could be the shape of the future of retail.

This is particularly worrying for those with the lowest income, for whom this increase is thought to hit the hardest - putting some produce such as meat right out of their price range.