Every agricultural show organiser from across the country will shortly receive a letter penned by Scotland’s Rural Affairs Secretary encouraging them to cater with local and Scottish produce.
In a bid to rid the “celebrations of Scottish farming” of fast food vans and outlets that serve food with no traceability, Richard Lochhead revealed his plans to a packed room of industry players at a GoRural Agritourism event, at Loch Leven.
In line with Homecoming and the 2014 Glasgow Commonwealth Games, Mr Lochhead said he wants to see Scottish produce served up at all agri shows and events starting from this year.
“Local food and drink is now one of the central reasons why people enjoy coming to Scotland,” said Mr Lochhead.
“Agri-events and agri-businesses are at the forefront of being able to offer that and 2014 is the time to make the best of that opportunity.”
With “absolutely massive” opportunities across the tourism, and specifically agritourism, industry now out there, Mr Lochhead said the Scottish Government is trying to do its bit to promote the key themes that people visit Scotland for with food and drink undoubtedly a front-runner.
He said ‘Think Local’ is a prime example of an initiative geared towards the promotion of local food and drink, celebrating Scotland’s “food culture”.
But while Scotland’s farm shops, farm stays, farm destination and experiences can all expand and benefit from local procurement agricultural shows should be doing their bit also.
“I’m actually just in the middle of writing to all of our agricultural shows in Scotland saying that as we are celebrating farming and agriculture at the shows, of which there are many in Scotland, we should also be ensuring that we are serving local food and drink at them as well,” he said.
Mr Lochhead stressed it is key that fast food vans particularly as well as any catering outlets involved in the serving of food to members of the public at agricultural events should be taking on board local provenance.
“It is important these outlets should be able to tell the customer where their food has come from, or where the meat that goes into the burger they are serving is from, and so forth,” Mr Lochhead said.
“This is an important link between the agritourism and food and drink agenda at the same time,” he said.
Speaking at the same event, Scotland Food and Drink chief executive James Withers revealed Scotland’s flagship agricultural event the Royal Highland Show is already moving to implement its own Food Charter, which will echo that designed for Glasgow’s Commonwealth Games.
“Obviously this year is set to be huge. It’s a once in a lifetime year for Scotland,” said Mr Withers.
“1.5 billion people will tune in to the Commonwealth Games and we will be serving more than two million meals to athletes in Glasgow over the 11 days,” he said..
“These meals will all now be governed by a charter, which demands a Scottish-first policy in the procurement of food for that big event,” he said.
“What a brilliant legacy that could be.”
The Royal Highland and Agricultural Society for Scotland, he revealed, has spoken to SF&D whilst looking to adopt their own form of food charter to drive catering towards Scotland’s supply chain.
“The actions of big events such as these will really showcase what we are doing in Scotland,” said Mr Withers.
Elaborating on the adoption of a food charter for the Royal Highland Show, RHASS chief executive Stephen Hutt, who was also in attendance at the conference, said it will provide a complete connect with what the society is doing particularly in terms of the launch of its inaugural Eat, Drink, Discover Scotland event later this year.
“The society will be implementing a food charter which will tie up our flagship Royal Highland Show event with not only our new food and drink event, but with Homecoming Scotland too,” said Mr Hutt.
“It will cover all of our events and will have the procurement of Scottish produce at the heart of its principle.”
Mr Hutt said the charter will enable the RHASS to work with all of its catering providers to ensure there is a high standard across all the fast food outlets at Ingliston.
Expanding on Mr Hutt’s comments, trade stands manager for the Royal Highland Show, Mags Clark, said the charter will allow for full traceability, with an “emphasis on the local supply chain”.
“We already know that the vast majority of our caterers serve Scottish produce, but we want to help them to better publicise that,” she said.
“There is often a perception that food served from a fast food van is of a lower quality, but this is not the case.
“The charter will give the opportunity for transparency of the food chain and it will confirm to the public that caterers at the Highland Show only serve food that is fully traceable and either Scottish, or ethically sourced.”