Even if it were true that some retailers were earning excessive margins, capitalism has an excellent remedy, which is that people like to make high returns on their capital and effort. Would Aldi and Lidl have come into the UK market a couple decades ago if Tesco's margins were low? Maybe eventually, but other markets would have been more attractive at the time.
Competition has indeed squeezed the margins of the supermarkets to eliminate any super profit.
However that still leaves the many small farmers as price takers, even when uneconomic, and probably more so that 20 years ago given the squeeze on retailers’ margins will inevitably increase the pressure to keep input costs down.
The answer must lie in the key words of your description: *many* farmers, *few* supermarkets. Food retailing has consolidated from thousands of small high street shops to huge supermarkets run by a handful of huge businesses; most farming remains small and fragmented, still in the world of the 1940s high street shop. Farming similarly needs to consolidate so that it can have price negotiations on equal terms with supermarkets, like the conversations that no doubt happen between Tesco and Unilever.
A good example of farmers consolidating through the use of a cooperative venture in the US is Ocean Spray Cranberries, which has I think close to $2 billion in revenues. It is actually the joint sales arm of around 700 independent cranberry farmers in Massachusetts, where it started in 1930, and other states. Also, in the US, small farmers that aren't too far from big cities can get retail prices or higher if bring fresh produce to sell at farmers' markets.
Is there a material difference here in calling them the romantic name i.e. farmers, rather than the more descriptive name of 'farmland owners'?
Land owners who are owners of capital who benefit from significant subsidies, allowances and protections in the UK that did not apply to say owners of mills, railways or shipyards.
Even if it were true that some retailers were earning excessive margins, capitalism has an excellent remedy, which is that people like to make high returns on their capital and effort. Would Aldi and Lidl have come into the UK market a couple decades ago if Tesco's margins were low? Maybe eventually, but other markets would have been more attractive at the time.
Competition has indeed squeezed the margins of the supermarkets to eliminate any super profit.
However that still leaves the many small farmers as price takers, even when uneconomic, and probably more so that 20 years ago given the squeeze on retailers’ margins will inevitably increase the pressure to keep input costs down.
The answer must lie in the key words of your description: *many* farmers, *few* supermarkets. Food retailing has consolidated from thousands of small high street shops to huge supermarkets run by a handful of huge businesses; most farming remains small and fragmented, still in the world of the 1940s high street shop. Farming similarly needs to consolidate so that it can have price negotiations on equal terms with supermarkets, like the conversations that no doubt happen between Tesco and Unilever.
A good example of farmers consolidating through the use of a cooperative venture in the US is Ocean Spray Cranberries, which has I think close to $2 billion in revenues. It is actually the joint sales arm of around 700 independent cranberry farmers in Massachusetts, where it started in 1930, and other states. Also, in the US, small farmers that aren't too far from big cities can get retail prices or higher if bring fresh produce to sell at farmers' markets.
Is there a material difference here in calling them the romantic name i.e. farmers, rather than the more descriptive name of 'farmland owners'?
Land owners who are owners of capital who benefit from significant subsidies, allowances and protections in the UK that did not apply to say owners of mills, railways or shipyards.