What is the drought resilience and water use in UK Horticulture?
In DRY, we worked with Liz Williams and David Denny, Horticultural Trades Association (HTA) and Nicola Dunn and Harley Stoddart, Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board (AHDB) to gain insights about how ornamental and edible horticulture businesses are dealing with drought as a risk and water as a resource. Horticulture is very vulnerable to drought as even short periods without main supply are potentially very damaging to plants.
In 2020, the HTA ran a survey of UK garden centres and ornamentals growers. It paints a picture of an industry that is already taking action on water resilience, and that wants to do more.
- UK garden centres and ornamentals growers use around 20 million cubic metres of water a year
- 50% of UK ornamental plant growers use rainwater capture systems, and 32% don’t but would like to
- 41% of growers use reservoirs to store water, minimising reliance on mains during times of shortage
- 58% of garden centres use automated watering systems for at least some of their watering, increasing efficiency and reducing workload for staff
- 74% of the water a garden centre uses is for watering plants, 8% on customer toilets, and 13% on the cafe/restaurant. The rest is used for other purposes.
Within the DRY project, we talked about the nature of the business, the knowledge used to run it, its drought resilience (past, present and future), its strategies for water management and what key insights could be shared. Much of the water-related thinking in this sector is about sustainability – so considering water as a finite resource, connections to energy use – and cost. We found business approaches to water management in this sector are multi-faceted. Some businesses have long histories of water storage on site; many are developing efficiencies in how water is distributed to plants. The summer 2018 drought provided a test for some water supply systems; most previous experience in horticulture is in dealing with short-term droughts.
We would like to thank the horticulture businesses for working with us on the digital story work. We hope this, in return, promotes their positive water practices nationally.
Themes that emerged from our interviews with horticulture businesses, with links to digital stories.
Additional resources
Links to Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board (AHDB) guides
- “Establishing a resilient water supply” (PDF Factsheet 06/19)
- “Advice for farmers and growers on water restrictions”
- “Securing a fair share of water: a strategy for agriculture and horticulture”
Horticultural Trades Association (HTA) website – Sustainability resources (water)
Links to additional UK Guidance
