The future of rural policy post Brexit

There is so much written already and so much discussion about how farming and the environment will feature in a post Brexit world but are all the conversations taking place in different rooms?
I have just been looking up the information on the Greener UK about the lobbying being done by this group for securing environmental protection after we leave the UK. The alliance of 'green NGOs' has a long list of worthy contributors and subscribers but I could have guessed most of them.
In a separate room are the farming lobby organisations keen to make sure that they don't face the sort of rules that make it impossible to farm and make a profit in future. They are well known too.
Both groups include a significant proportion of organisations funded principally by membership subscriptions. Others make their money oiling the wheels of their respective organisations; selling products to farming on the one hand or advising those who implement environmental policies on the other. There is a lack of objective and dispassionate comment. Scientific consensus is often absent and academics too suffer from conflicts on interest.
Surely this is a debate that is important enough for all to work together because there is more at stake than just farming and the environment. Why, for example, are we to have a Government paper on the environment separate from any paper on agriculture? Why is there not a paper on food? This is a crucially important time for both farming and the environment; for communities and individuals; for food; for landscape and for urban and rural places. They all need each other- these are often symbiotic relationships.
Let us hope that, for activity in rural areas, Government recognise that it is not just DEFRA that is involved. Yes they are in one room but in other rooms are DH (Health);  DCMS (digital connectivity); BEIS (business); CLG (planning); DFT (rural transport); DEEU (exiting the EU) and DIT (trade).
This is why it will be interesting to have the subject studied by a group that are not sponsored by a Government Department nor by membership bodies and includes those who work in the health sector- surely the unspoken voice in a debate about what we eat, where it comes from and what it costs. The recently announced Food, Farming and Countryside Commission working under the auspices of the RSA is attempting to do that and it will be interesting to see the results of the two year study that is just starting.

Devon Starter Farm does its job

Devon Starter Farm Does Its Job



64 acre (26 ha) or 99 acres (40 ha) now available for new tenant

In the summer of 2013 I chaired the "Future of Farming" review and then launched it with the then Farming Minister, David Heath, addressing the challenges faced by new entrants in the farming industry. While making the point that there are several ways to get into farming, the report highlighted the lack of farmers retiring and consequently the lack of opportunities for young people to set up their own farming business.



Coincidentally that same summer an opportunity arose on the Fursdon Estate in Mid-Devon to create a starter farm which was made available on the basis either of a Farm Business Tenancy or any other business arrangement that applicants felt attractive. The farm is Rixham Farm at Cadbury and consists of around 64 acres (25 ha) of pasture together with a modern three-bedroom house, an agricultural building and glorious views over the Mid Devon countryside.

The opportunity in 2013 attracted 55 applicants from all over the country who all had the opportunity to view the farm and to submit an application based on a business model of what they would do at the property. Obviously with a mere 64 acres then, most applicants explained how they would need to supplement their income with earnings off the farm or else carry out a specialist enterprise which earned them enough from the property itself. Amongst various weird and wonderful suggestions there were a number of serious bids and the eventual winners relocated from East Devon and set up their business in September 2013. This combined a traditional sheep enterprise with a family daily care-farm supplemented with income from agricultural contracting.

My wife and I hoped that Rixham Farm would provide a launch pad for a young family to establish themselves in farming. We were therefore delighted to hear that the tenants had been successful in their bid for a 120 acre farm on the Devon County Council let estate; double the size and something that would not have been possible for them without their experience gained on the farm at Cadbury.

As a result, the farm is now available to let once more from 29 September 2017 This time around however, there will be 35 acres more available nearby at Christmas, making a farm of 99 acres (40 ha). It is offered on the same basis i.e. a 10-year Farm Business Tenancy or on some other arrangement that proves to be mutually beneficial both to the Estate and to the applicants. There will be a break clause at the five-year point which coincides with the expected date when the existing CAP support regime will come to an end and by then there should be a clearer vision about what will succeed it.

We are keen to encourage applicants with an interest not only in animal husbandry but also the environment. There is already a Higher Level Stewardship Agreement on the home farm and they see the opportunity for the successful applicant to use the unique qualities of landscape, biodiversity and the history of the 750 year old estate to add value to products using for example visitors to the house and gardens and holiday accommodation nearby.

Details are available from admin@fursdon.co.uk and viewing and interviews will take place in August.

Enquiries

For all press enquiries, contact David Fursdon on 07970 089526, or 01392 860860 (david@fursdon.co.uk).

For all farm enquiries, contact Judi Chambers or Debbie Gale on 01392 860860 (admin@fursdon.co.uk).

 



 

Christmas food shopping- a new way?

I admit that I don't shop that often. I wouldn't say that I was the main shopper in our household. Yet I did find myself authorized to do some food shopping before Christmas and I found myself experiencing nostalgia not really for the items on offer but the methods of shopping.
I'll start with a general gripe. The expression 'stocking fillers' in bold type seemed to me to send out the wrong signals to any young child who could read but still believed in Father Christmas.
Then there is the question of customer service. However good the training, it just is not possible to get sufficient information, sufficiently easily if you are shopping in an aircraft hangar of a building that sells a huge variety of goods and cannot therefore have so much expertise on tap. Specifically on food however there was something about being able to  smell and examine vegetables and fruit for example without them being wrapped and packed and plastered in stickers, which has now disappeared from many shops.
I stuck lucky in Crediton- our local market town. Firstly I could drive right into the centre and park. There were spouts available in sufficient quantity and loose and not in shrink wrapped packets of six! There is, Alleluia, a cheese shop selling, amongst others, local cheeses that the 'big' food retailers now seem to have withdrawn from their shelves ( not surprising that the dairy farms are struggling). There is an ironmonger too.
Do you remember those card games of 'happy families' that we played as children? Mr Bun the Baker for example. The pack of cards would be small today.
Much has been said about the 'death of the High Street' and I accept that urban planning is challenged in this area. Product price is an issue as is convenience and cheap or free parking. I just wonder whether there is a model that allows independent shops to come together and offer a combined facility for customers which will enable them to survive against the advantages of the large retailers.
There would need to be a way of drawing in outside investment and the independents too would need some equity share and the planners would have to be on side. It would provide a more secure and sustainable outlet for those farms who supply farmers markets. #justsaying
I hope that you had a good Christmas and that 2016 is good for you

Two great men

This coming Friday will see the funeral and memorial service for Henry McCreath in Berwick-upon-Tweed. This coming Friday is also the 50th anniversary of the funeral of Winston Churchill.
I make no apology for mentioning them in a blog about rural matters.
Henry McCreath was born in June 1915 in Berwick.

Most of his career was in the grain trade- early on in the family grain business and, after the war, in the same business that he resurrected with his brother Geoff (another great man) who was my father-in-law (H.G.McCreath & Co). He had a distinguished career being well known to farmers in the Borders and Northumberland, being President of the UK Agricultural Supply Trade Association in 1972/3, being a J.P. and chairman of the bench and finally being given honorary Freedom of Berwick at the age of 96, three years ago.
He was a man of great determination which not only served him well in business but also in his greatest challenge; surviving the Japanese Prisoner of War Camps in Changi and along the Burma/Siam railway and the river Kwai. He was taken prisoner only a week after arriving in Singapore as a Captain in the 9th Northumberland Fusiliers yet throughout his incarceration was committed to the men who served with him.
For many years the only people with whom he could talk about his horrendous experiences were the others who knew what it was like- the members of his local FEPoW (Far East Prisoners of War) group for example. I suspect that farmers too were good to deal with in that respect- straightforward, no-nonsense and not too obviously emotional. Farming is a fairly solitary occupation after all.
I was at school near Westerham in Kent where Winston Churchill lived for the last few years of his life near his beloved Chartwell.

I remember, as a young boy, going to wave up at his upstairs window at which he appeared on his 90th birthday. I remember too the activity surrounding the date of his death, the church service in the local church and then the pageantry of his funeral.
In some ways flawed, in others inspirational, he too will be associated with the 2nd World War. Like Henry he too appreciated the countryside whether it was portraying it in his painting or encouraging the farmers and Land Girls in their wartime production.
So it is time to remember two great men; leaders in peacetime and in war whose funerals coincide 50 years apart.

Christmas 1914

100 years ago this Christmas the allied forces were bogged down in trenches facing the German Army. In the trenches at Ploegsteert, near Ypres, with the London Rifle Brigade was my 21 year old grandfather George whose initial euphoria about going to war was fading.  In letters written in December a century ago to his mother Charlotte here in Cadbury he said “ the flat country, the awful mud and wet- in fact I feel sometimes what is it all for.. I feel so homesick so often and then fancy death.” The barrage of the guns was unceasing and relentless. Then a wonderful thing happened...

In George’s own words in letters to his mother and his father written at Christmas in 1914 he said “It was the most extraordinary thing I have ever known was the Christmas Day truce. I will tell you about it when I return. I gave a match box that Harriet gave me years ago to a German officer as my souvenir. I hope to get it back.

 I had to superintend my platoon working in front of some trenches on Christmas Eve. It was freezing as hard as nails just as you were burning the log at Fursdon. How I thought of you. But the Germans did not fire at all. Instead they had 3 huge Christmas trees (of course we did not fire) and they sang hymns and then we in our trenches sang carols and we cheered each other and then they had a cornet and played different tunes which we encored and applauded. Thus passed Christmas Eve. Yet to think that 6 hours before we were trying to kill each other. 

Then on Christmas morning we put our heads over the trenches and waved to one another (no firing) and as we had 5 German dead in front of our trenches I walked out with a corporal and signalled to the Germans to meet us half way- the trenches are only 50 yards apart-they came out and they spoke English and I explained and they were pleased. One of the men I spoke to was a hairdresser in Liverpool Street. They spoke very good English and they were not keen to start fighting again. So we carried their dead half way out and they took them and buried them. They then had a short service and their officer made a short speech in which they thanked us for our kindness and then we exchanged souvenirs, shook hands and went back to our trenches. Thus there was a mutual truce on Christmas day. Afterwards we still waved etc and still the truce continues".

I am going to read this passage at our village Carol Service on 18th December and it will be followed by the carol “Silent Night” which was one of the carols sung that Christmas in Flanders. We hope that the choir will be singing the opening verse of the carol in German.

Only one chance to get it right

Just as people often justify investment in land by saying 'they don't make it any more' so when people build in the countryside that will be an irreversible change not least because of the value that building has added to the underlying land. It is hardly surprising therefore that debates about the future of the countryside have become so heated with the fires stoked by the planning reforms introduced by the coalition Government.
At the HHA AGM last week Simon Jenkins, immediate past Chairman of the National Trust, spoke about his idea of listing the landscape in the same way as buildings are listed grade I,II or II*. I remember debating this on the Today programme in 2007 when I expressed my doubts about this- doubts which I still have.

One of the advantages of our current listing system is that it is moderated by English Heritage which ensures some consistency of approach. It is salutary when a building which you or your local council think is particularly important is revealed by English Heritage to be one of many and not as unusual as you think. As with other designations (SSSIs for example) listing is sometimes used as a tool by those opposed to development whether for personal or aesthetic reasons so the procedure must be robust.
Listing the landscape would immediately introduce a flood of applications from wealthy incomers to rural areas determined to oppose development which might spoil their view whether it was for a necessary agricultural building, a discreet development of affordable homes or an inappropriate sprawl of identikit modern houses. Left to determination at a local level would leave the system exposed to abuse when the rules would be set and enforced by understaffed and harassed local authorities without the bigger picture and with the inherent risk of acting as judge and jury. Set nationally it would require a body such as Natural England- itself starved of resources- to set the rules.
What would those rules be? It is difficult enough with listed buildings where variations in building styles and materials have varied through time and with geography. Yet it has become possible through the application of expert historical, architectural and archaeological knowledge to develop some rules. With land it is a much more subjective judgment that may be less about physical form and more about interpretation and individual appreciation.
Whether we are talking about buildings or landscape we cannot create museum pieces. They must live. Simon Jenkins himself has been a strong advocate of bringing life back to National Trust houses- something I have been delighted to see happen in the last few years. Just as I have been a strong advocate of finding a viable use for historic buildings (to provide an income stream for their repair and maintenance) so would this be necessary for landscapes, which carry the strong imprint of man.
A friend of mine who is keen on music and an opera lover told me how he now finds music without the human voice less fulfilling. Many consider that the stone walls and barns of the Yorkshire Dales do the same for their stunning landscapes.
If we were to list what we consider our 'best' landscapes then I feel sorry for those who would end up looking out on those that were at the bottom of the pile. How could planners prevent the inevitable rash of development on these unexceptional but important landscapes which perhaps provide important green space for those living nearby.
All this highlights the complex and changing nature of the factors which bear on the development of our landscape. We have developed a somewhat tortuous but generally effective system of planning in the countryside which had become perhaps too stultifying and may now have become too loose. In my view to set the future of our landscape within the straitjacket of a listing system would be a mistake. This is not to say that I disagree with Simon about the need to protect our wonderful countryside and the settings of some of our iconic buildings. I believe that we need the pendulum to swing back so that we can develop a planning system which is consistent, fair and appropriate and resourced appropriately. Perhaps it is this question of resourcing that needs the most attention.     

 Climate Change- what does it mean for rural business?

The climate change debate is like a boxing match. In the red corner are the climate change ‘enforcers’ and in the blue corner the climate change ‘deniers’. Both ‘boxers’ have been training in separate gyms. They have issued their own statements to the pre-fight press conference. They don’t speak and then the bell goes and they start hitting each other. No communications can the heard except for grunts and the noise of glove on jaw.

It is hard for the majority of people to know where to start in this debate although that doesn’t stop some individuals from pronouncing with great certainty. It is hard because it is so complicated and the climate is a model with so many moving parts. Think of how sophisticated climate modeling computers are and how they still struggle with a forecast that is more than 10 days away.

As I try to make sense of it I remember the flawed information on climate change from the University of East Anglia apparently supporting the notion of climate change, the fact that the weather recordings over the last 20 years or so have shown negligible temperature increases and the snow falls that have taken place in this country together with ships have becomes locked in pack ice in the Arctic recently.Yet I also note that passages through the ice have opened up for the first time for many years, that some glaciers have retreated miles and that some plants are flowering in the middle of winter.

Then there is the question of what to blame if you do accept that the climate is changing and, if so, what should be done about it and by whom. Is it CO2 or is it methane? Is the problem the drying out of peat or emissions from agriculture or from power stations? In a world climatic system how can one country influence another? Is this done by example or treaty? Should countries economic growth be held back when such growth can save lives? What is the ‘whole-life’ carbon cost of new technology that hasn’t been fully tested and while CO2 emissions from burning wood balances its absorption by growing trees, is that the right way of looking at it?

I tend to feel that the greater the professed certainty that people have in this debate the more uncertain I become. Without the benefit of huge computers and scientific laboratories I have to rely on my own experience.

What I have noticed is that we are suffering more extremes, in both directions. This is not a surprise in a country that sits on the edge of the European continent and whose climate is artificially controlled by the operation of the Gulf Stream. The jet stream seems to need oiling to restore its flexibility. If you live in the country you see it at first hand. If you are farming the impact is raw. How much summer feed can you make and how much will you need in the winter? How many pests and diseases will affect your crops or trees and how will you protect them. If you run a tourism business, the weather impacts on visitor numbers not only for day visitors but also holiday makers. These questions all therefore, have £ signs against them. Naively I thought that after the storms of 1987 and 1990 most of the mature trees that were going to come down had come down. These trees were destroyed last month by a lightening strike.

Whatever the experts say we are definitely living in more challenging climatic times and anything that we can do to help the situation we should. Whatever may be happening to the climate naturally we don't want to make it worse. What we need however is clarity, open debate, scientific consensus and this then needs to be translated into clear political consensus around which we can coalesce. Am I too optimistic? In the meantime we need to work out how to mitigate the effects of this variability. Farming and tourism will be in the front line.