Colours of spring.

Henley Standard Farming Matters May.

Spring is one of my favourite times of the year, seeing everything burst into life and the countryside turn from a dull grey colour to a kaleidoscope of green, with trees and hedges waking up from their winter slumbers. These are the things that fill me with joy. Into the colour palate comes the eye-catching splash of yellow from flowering oilseed rape, now starting to disappear as the flowers drop to be replaced by seed pods.

It has been a very long winter which seems to have eclipsed the early part of spring as more rain plagued March and into early April. The few dry periods that we have had over the past few weeks have allowed farmers on easier working soils to make a start on sowing crops. Some planned, others to replace flooded or poorly performing crops established in the autumn. Those winter crops that have escaped the torrid winter are now powering away after having received nitrogen fertiliser in March. We just need some help from the weather between now and the start of the cereal harvest in July. Vegetables and salad crop harvesting is ongoing throughout the year and these growers are really struggling with the conditions which will have an impact on supply this year.

Why has there been so much unrest amongst the farming communities both here and in Europe? French farmers took to the streets earlier this year causing all sorts of chaos on the roads and in major cities. This was repeated in other European Countries as politicians tried to force through changes that would affect their businesses. Farmers have been protesting about high costs, low product prices, cheap non-EU imports and strict environmental rules. These protests have worried EU politicians as they face European elections in June, so much so that they have reined back on some stricter rules on pesticides and emissions that were due to be introduced. More dialogue between farmers and politicians on food security has been promised.

Many of these subjects are also affecting UK farmers, in particular Welsh producers. They have taken direct action against their government’s attempt to introduce poorly thought-out environmental schemes, which many see as a threat to their business. The Welsh government’s lack of action on bovine TB, which is causing a huge amount of turmoil to cattle farmers in Wales, has added to the unhappy atmosphere in the industry.

Meanwhile, English farmers close to the port of Dover took direct action over plans to move import checks away from the port and locate it further inland. This would threaten biosecurity as meat products, possibly carrying a livestock related disease, could just disappear before being checked.

There was a tractor demonstration outside of the Houses of Parliament on 25^th March protesting about the same things that their European colleagues were. In this case it was a peaceful drive past in the evening to cause less inconvenience to people. Many English farmers feel let down by the government and the food industry but don’t wish to upset their consumers. I started writing this piece on the day that Tesco announced record pretax profits of £2.3bn up from £882m. It seems someone in the industry is making money whilst at the same time claiming to help consumers by lowering prices. Much of this is on the back of cheap imports and paying home producers below the cost of production. Sounds familiar? Maybe our fellow farmers across the channel have a point.

I recently had a trip back to Harper Adams University, where I studied agriculture, for a reunion. As I walked into the meeting area I stopped, thinking I was in the wrong place. Who were all these old looking people? Then I realised that like me, they no longer resembled that group of eager youngsters that left in 1980 to change the world. Still, we had an amazing weekend and visited the now extensive campus finishing in the bar. Somethings never seem to change.

In other news, the investigation into Red Tractor’s decision to introduce a bolt on environmental module as part of its farm assurance inspections has been completed.  An independent review found that they had followed the agreed governance process but had fallen short of what its farmer members expected. After initially saying they would continue with the Greener Farm commitment, they later dropped this after further outrage and industry pressure. This in no way removes farmers’ commitment to meeting their environmental responsibilities. It does however now remain the property of farmers and landowners rather than being pulled up the food supply chain to use as green washing, which is a sensible conclusion to the review process. We all need to work together to provide safe food and look after the environment whilst fighting climate change.