UK Feed Market Outlook – Winter 2025/6

The feed industry urges livestock producers to carefully consider their feed requirements through to late spring 2026 and to discuss these with their feed suppliers at the earliest opportunity.

A combination of geopolitical events, a challenging UK harvest, and an exceptionally dry summer in some regions has placed pressure on feed supply this autumn. Whilst the feed industry and livestock farmers are currently managing to balance nutrient requirements and supply, it is unusual to have to manage such pressures so early in the season.

Geopolitics

The UK feed industry needs to source 16 million tonnes of raw materials annually. Of this, 54% is sourced locally and 46% is imported. The imported proportion is dominated by the high-protein category (soya), important fibre sources for ruminants such as palm kernel expeller and soya hulls, and other materials including maize, rapeseed meal, sunflower meal, etc. We also import many of our essential feed additives (vitamins, amino acids, etc.).

International commodity supply chains are generally effective in managing risks such as conflict, extreme weather events, and the impact of climate change. However, additional challenges arising from regulatory and trade policy uncertainty add pressure to the system. Tariffs—proposed or actual—and anti-dumping measures shift supply and demand patterns. This is particularly true of markets reliant on forward contracts, where the terms of future supply may not be known.

Deforestation policy uncertainty, particularly regarding the EU Deforestation Regulation (EUDR), is having a dramatic impact on the European soya supply chain. A lack of clarity over EUDR is resulting in very few market offers for soya products for Q1/Q2 2026. The European Feed Manufacturers' Federation (FEFAC) anticipates an EUDR premium for soya bean meal in the EU of between 5% and 10% above the ‘normal’ price (a premium of €20–€40 per tonne).

In the UK, UK Soy Manifesto signatories—representing 60% of the UK footprint for soya in animal feed—will be looking to require their suppliers to source deforestation free soya products for 2026. This will include EUDR aligned product and feed businesses and their suppliers will need to discuss how to manage any ‘EUDR aligned premiums’ with their customers.

The recent UK–US trade agreement removed the 19% import tariff on US bioethanol, rendering the two UK bioethanol plants unviable. A co-product of bioethanol production is distillers’ dark grains with solubles (DDGS), and the UK plants combined would produce 750,000 tonnes annually. The feed industry now has to source DDGS from outside the UK, adding time and cost to the supply chain.

UK Harvest and Dry Summer

UK arable farmers provide much of the cereal supply needed by the feed industry and a significant proportion of oilseed rape meal, although there is increasing reliance on imports due to reduced acreage grown in the UK. However, UK production and yields in 2025 are expected to boost local availability. UK flour millers and sugar refiners also provide valuable co-products such as wheatfeed and sugar beet pulp.

The exceptionally dry summer has left many dairy, beef, and sheep farmers short of both grass for grazing and forage for winter feeding, although the situation varies considerably by region. Farmers short of grass have been feeding forage and combining it with wheatfeed, reducing the availability of wheatfeed for feed compounders.

These same compounders are seeing increased demand for feed due to the lack of grass and forage and would generally look to add sugar beet pulp to their ruminant rations. The UK sugar beet season is starting late due to the dry weather, and volumes are likely to be down, resulting in the feed industry relying on imported sugar beet pulp to fill the gap.

Sugar beet pulp is a good source of fibre for ruminants, and if it is in short supply, feed businesses will look to other sources of fibre such as palm kernel expeller or soya hulls. Both are imported co-products, and their supply and price are impacted by the uncertainty surrounding deforestation policy (EUDR) in Europe.

Import Dependency

Given the above, there is a growing trend towards import dependency in the feed industry. The sourcing approach remains ‘as local as possible, as global as necessary’, but the market conditions described above point towards a higher level of import reliance through to Q2 2026. This in itself does not pose a threat to raw material availability or feed supply; the main implication is one of timing. It is not possible to respond to short-term demand in an import-dependent situation.

The feed industry urges livestock farmers to prepare thorough and accurate feed requirements, with the help of their registered feed advisers, through to the end of Q2 2026. It would also be prudent to factor in uncertainty over weather conditions in Q2 2026, where dairy, beef, and sheep producers may have to manage difficult and unexpected conditions. Forage stocks will be very tight in some areas, making planning nutritional requirements at the tail end of winter even more important.