Overseas sales of UK food and drink continued to soar last year, with record exports of over £22 billion demonstrating a clear desire for British taste, quality and high standards around the world.

UK food and drink businesses are now selling their products to 217 markets – with sales of milk & cream increasing by 61%, salmon by 23% and pork by 14%.

An increasing thirst for British tipples has also seen bottles of UK beer appearing on shelves as far as Japan and New Zealand, while gin continues to go through a ‘ginaissance’ with international sales of UK brands reaching over £500 million. From January to December 2017 we also sent £85 million worth of cheese to France, £21 million of chocolate to Belgium and even £2 million of tea to China.

Secretary of State for the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Michael Gove said:

Farmers, fisherman and our food producers are all helping to deliver a Brexit bonus – with more exports of British food and drink than ever.

Contrary to the constant negativity of the doom-mongers, the British economy is going from strength to strength showing that a Green Brexit can deliver for the whole country.

This growing hunger for UK produce reveals the huge opportunities for producers and manufacturers as the UK prepares to leave the European Union. The US remains the largest market outside of the EU – worth £2.3 billion last year and rising 3% from the previous year.

As the Prime Minister demonstrated during her recent trip to China, the UK’s mouth-watering food and drink continues to grow in popularity across the globe with China now the 8th largest export market for UK food and drink. Over £560 million worth of food and drink was bought by Chinese consumers last year, who showed a particular preference for UK salmon, whisky and pork.

Food and Drink Federation Director General Ian Wright CBE said:

UK food and drink is known across the globe for its provenance and quality. We are a proud home to many of the world’s most beloved brands.

We must now build upon this platform in order to take advantage of new opportunities and the growing global appetite for great British and Northern Irish manufacturing as we leave the EU.

The Government, and its team of trade experts, continues to encourage and support UK business as they consider launching into overseas markets or expanding their current global customer base.

This is complemented by the government’s Food is GREAT campaign, which highlights the success of current exporters and showcases the UK’s top quality food and drink.

In addition, last month, industry representatives and government officials held the first meeting of the newly created Food and Drink Sector Council. The Council will work together to boost productivity, meaning industry will be better placed to take advantage of emerging opportunities to access more markets and boost exports as we leave the European Union.

Major UK exports include:

• Whisky (£4.5 billion)
• Salmon (£720 million)
• Chocolate (£680 million)
• Cheese (£623 million)
• Beer (£603 million)
• Shellfish (£600 million)

Top 5 countries we export to:

• Irish Republic (£3.7 billion)
• France (£2.3 billion)
• USA (£2.3 billion)
• Netherlands (£1.5 billion)
• Germany (£1.4 billion)

Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson has today (10 February) visited Cox’s Bazar in Bangladesh, where over a million Rohingya Muslim refugees are living in crowded and unsafe refugee camps

Over 688,000 people have fled from their homes in Burma’s Rakhine State into Bangladesh since August 2017, joining around 340,000 Rohingya who had previously fled.

The Foreign Secretary toured a camp which is home to 500,000 refugees – equivalent to a city the size of Leicester.

He met Rohingya families and community leaders to learn about the persecution they have suffered, and hear first-hand about the challenges that life in the camps presents. He listened to their views, heard about their hopes for the future, and the conditions they believed needed to be put in place for any return to take place.

Mr Johnson visited a UNICEF child-friendly site where he saw the efforts being made to keep young people safe. He sat down with some children on the site to talk about their drawings. He was also briefed on gender-based violence by caseworkers.

Tomorrow (11 February) Mr Johnson will hold talks with Aung San Suu Kyi to discuss the crisis and press for the end to the suffering in Rakhine and the safe and voluntary return of the refugees.

Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said:

I have seen for my own eyes the horrendous living conditions the Rohingya people are having to endure and it has only further strengthened my commitment to working with international partners to improve the lives of these people in 2018.

I pay tribute to the hospitality and compassion shown by the government of Bangladesh, who are facing an enormous challenge in providing humanitarian assistance to the Rohingya community.

While I welcome steps by both the Burmese and Bangladeshi governments towards ensuring that these people can return home, it is vital that the Rohingya refugees must be allowed to their homes in Rakhine voluntarily, in safety and with dignity, under international oversight, and when the conditions in Burma are right.

Notes to editors

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The Charity Commission has made the following statement in response to concerns raised in the media regarding Oxfam:

A report of the Commission’s ongoing case into Oxfam from December 2017 can be found on GOV.UK

His first stop will be Honaria, the capital of the Solomon Islands, where he will meet the Governor General Sir Frank Kabui, and the Prime Minister of the Solomon Islands, Hon. Rick Houenipwela to discuss trade and the UK-Solomon Islands bilateral relationship post-Brexit.

The Minister will then travel to New Zealand, where he will meet the Mayors of Auckland and Whangarei, as well as taking part in a roundtable discussion with the Regional Chamber of Commerce. In Wellington, he will meet the Minister for External Trade, Minister for Environment and Minister for Economic Development among others, and attend an England vs New Zealand cricket match at Westpac stadium.

In Australia, Mark Field will visit Sydney, Canberra and Perth. In Sydney the Minister will have a tour of the Royal Botanical Gardens, where he will learn about the Garden’s science activities and research links with London’s Kew Gardens. He will also meet the New South Wales Minister for Innovation.

In Canberra the Minister will discuss UK-Australia cooperation on key regional issues with the Minister for International Development and the Pacific. In Perth he will be visiting Pawsey Supercomputing Centre to explore opportunities for collaboration on high-performance computing, and hear about the centre’s involvement in the Square Kilometre Array.

Rt Hon Mark Field, Minister of State for Asia and the Pacific said:

This is my first visit to the Pacific region since becoming Minister at the Foreign Office, and I am delighted to be here.

The UK enjoys a historic relationship and modern partnership with the Solomon Islands, New Zealand and Australia. We have strong ties and an enduring friendship with this region, built on friendship and shared values.

Our strong security, prosperity and people-to-people links are more relevant than ever as work towards advancing our common interests both in the region and further afield.

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An app on an officer’s phone, combined with a handheld scanner, will mean police will be able to check fingerprints against both criminal and immigration records by connecting to the two live databases (IDENT1 and IABS) via the new Biometric Services Gateway.

West Yorkshire Police (WYP), who worked with the Home Office to trial the new system, will begin an initial roll out of 250 scanners to officers in the coming weeks – the app is already available to its 5,500 frontline officers. It is expected that another 20 forces across the country will roll out the system by the end of this year.

Minister for Policing and the Fire Service Nick Hurd said:

The Biometric Services Gateway is just one of a series of national systems the Home Office is designing with policing to give officers information at their fingertips faster than ever before.

By cutting out unnecessary trips to and from the police station, mobile technology is really helping to save valuable time and allowing officers to do what they do best – cutting crime and keeping us safe.

It’s clear that by embracing technology the police can improve efficiency and, if all forces delivered the level of productivity from mobile working as the leading forces, the average officer could spend an hour a day extra on the frontline.

The Biometric Services Gateway, enabled by Home Office technology, will also lead to significant costs savings, with the new system available at a fraction of the cost of those currently in use. The scanners used by WYP cost less than £300 – 10% of the cost of current mobile fingerprint systems.

To ensure the information accessed from the Biometric Services Gateway remains secure, fingerprints are not stored and are automatically deleted from the device once they have been checked.

As well as identifying a person of interest who may be withholding their name, the technology enables officers to rapidly identify someone experiencing a medical emergency and make contact with their next of kin.

Early examples of the new system in action include a firearms unit, who detained a driver after a short pursuit and were able to identify him as a disqualified driver, despite him giving false details. He was issued with a summons for three offences and his vehicle seized. The armed response unit returned to patrol within ten minutes, and without the mobile fingerprint scanner this could have resulted in the unit being out of action for four hours taking the individual to a custody suite.

West Yorkshire Police, Assistant Chief Constable Andy Battle said:

The introduction of these fingerprint devices is a significant step forward for West Yorkshire Police and marks another milestone in our technological ambitions.

As we have already experienced in the trial, the combination of these digital solutions bring tangible benefits to policing our communities.

It means we can submit fingerprints of suspects from the street to a live time national database and receive results in less than a minute.

We have seen first-hand, for instance, how this rapid identification has enabled speedy and accurate medical treatment based on the records available. Its use also allows relatives to attend hospital to see their loved ones when time is of the essence.

From an operational perspective, they quickly open investigative leads into serious crimes and can often reveal the associates of an otherwise unknown victim.

Likewise, they can immediately identify suspects who attempt to give false details and will prompt people to be more forthcoming in the first place.

The added benefit is that they provide greater value for money, which means we can increase their usage across the organisation.

West Yorkshire’s Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC), Mark Burns-Williamson and National APCC lead on Forensics and Biometrics said:

The introduction of the Biometrics Services Gateway shows how West Yorkshire Police is once again leading the way with new technology and builds on the investment and introduction of the handheld mobiles that all frontline officers use.

Using this advanced technology means officers are out on the street providing that visible presence rather than dealing with suspects in custody and could eventually enable the introduction of new automated systems, further ensuring officers are freed up to provide reassurance in our communities.

It is important that we continually improve our services to make sure the needs of our communities are at the heart of delivery. Investing in this cutting edge technology forms a crucial part of that picture, ensuring the public of West Yorkshire are safer and feel safer, but crucially testing this proof of concept so that the overall benefits can be rolled out across policing nationally for everyone’s benefit.