The present conflicts Ukraine and the Middle have shown they can severe effects on prices availability of many imported goods, including basic specialist foods; it would not the end of the world for us in the UK if import of, Saffron or Kobe Beef difficult, but import of wheat or other grains used quite literally, thousands of basic foodstuffs consumed millions every day become a matter of national importance. A debate is between farmers (through their representative and the Government about best new support aimed primarily at support environmental objectives, can be squared with the objective of food Some of the fields here awkwardly shaped and and quite frankly a pain work on with modern machines, no matter sophisticated they may be, I (along with many other farmers) am thinking ofplanting them with trees (move strongly supported in the SFI). Since we import 80% of the timber used the UK it might be argued that this is a good move, but would take my fields, potentially many thousands of other fields having agricultural soil out of production for perhaps 50 years (or possibly even Taking less productive land of growing food crops perhaps a way in which major difference of interest might be addressed. spokesman for the Commission recently: “We don’t want to plant trees on good land; food security is vital; we can’t stop that happening if a farmer chooses to do so.” The National Trust announced that it wants to some 50% of its land holding the UK (some 620,000 into environmental However, since much of land is good agricultural and tenanted by farmers (ie used for food production), a move could result in downturn in home-produced grain measured in millions of tonnes. Hopefully all the conflicts interest between (and possibly environmental degradation attempting to maintain production present in the schemes being introduced will be resolved eventually, but present upset over the delay in setting right the Post Office scandal over accounting software does fill me with confidence. Or perhaps lessons will have learned? But I am reminded a well known saying: “The only thing we learn history is that we don’t from history.” The photograph is a ‘shot’ from the farmhouse (looking out directly West), but showing surface flooding (largely subsided) from saturation of the soil following exceptionally rainfall in October-November, December. That is the the field is still stubble from 2023 harvested crop, and not yet been planted with crop for 2024 harvest.
Farming-Mike Page
