THE migrant issue has again prompted debate about how many people the UK can absorb.

Britain has rightly helped by funding the feeding and costs of Syrians in camps close to their home country. It is good to hear the EU is looking in that direction too.

The issue not yet written about in your letters section is our food availability here to feed our burgeoning population.

Joyce and Jeroen who both wrote lengthy letters on the migrant issue, may not realise that we have to import vast amounts of food. To feed the nation we import about 40% of food required and that amount is on the rise.

We are able to import food from other countries, not because we are wealthy, but because those countries are able to export to us, they have a surplus. This is not guaranteed.

A major United Nations report in 2014 highlighted the wheat yield reductions we can expect due to climate change droughts and floods across the globe. Wheat production will fall as the decades roll by compromising our food security.

In her letter Joyce Denness is right, Britain is a green and pleasant land but not much of it can produce staple foods such as wheat.

About 80% of our wheat is grown within a 50-mile radius of Cambridge including land which is not much above sea level. This century the sea is predicted to rise by a metre at least and no doubt important crop growing land will be inundated. Look how easy it was for the Somerset levels to flood two years ago.

The UK population is rising now by over a quarter of a million people without taking migration into account.

Add all those who come here each year, an additional 200,000 at least and it is no wonder that we need over 200,000 new homes every year for decades. When all the urban brown land has been built on where will the houses go next? That lovely green and pleasant land of course!

Colin Jarvis

Northlew