Food is our future

The East of England is  - by a long way - the breadbasket, oilseeds crushers, vegetable packing shed, sugar factory, and meat cutting room of England. Its brewing and wine industries are also among the nation's finest. This food and drink supply chain involves many farmers and food businesses, and employs a lot of people. 

The region takes in East Anglia but it is more than the ancient principality of Anglia. There is no space here for a complete history but we can provide a few pointers to the region’s heritage. The wool and worsted industry of Norfolk and Suffolk stemmed from the mercantile prosperity of Tudor times – and the impact can still be seen today in the buildings, churches and cathedrals across the region: Gothic architecture in almost all of the Cambridge Colleges, mercantile and Georgian houses in Kings' Lynn and Wisbech, and chocolate box pink villages in the Suffolk wool towns. Norwich, Bury St Edmunds and Ely. And wherever you travel you are never more than a few minutes away from a windmill.

Great artists and writers from the region include;  M R James, Arthur Ransome, Rider Haggard, Wilkie Collins, Angus Wilson, John Clare, Alfred Tennyson, Dorothy Wordsworth, Paul Gallico and Hammond Innes and, last but not least, John Constable. And, of course, there are links with farming pioneers of the past like Lord "Turnip" Townshend.