Letters from Transylvania! - All Comments

re: First snows!

paulm — Wed, 19 Dec 2007 12:16:45 GMT

Just read your report of your addition to the family - congratulations to you both. Recently sent you a 'catch-up' email to your yahoo address, noy sure whether you have picked it up yet but it will be great to hear from you again

re: The road to Transylvania

flash jacques — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 09:26:58 GMT

Clearly paradise is elusive or yet to be created!

I don’t regret moving to France to buy a farm, it’s a great place to live, bring up children and the climate is just that much better than the UK. Being in business, particularly a small one is a challenge here as well.

Your experiences with the bureaucrats in Romania don’t sound that unfamiliar, the difference, here it’s mainly us farmers that make the ridiculous rules up.

In order to farm one has to have “autorisation d’exploiter” or a permit from the local “Chambre d’Agriculture”. This is given out to those that have an agricultural qualification and practical experience of a certain level and if you have that, it’s easy to obtain (one meeting each month except August!)

The problem comes if you wish to expand (if you qualify and are taking over an existing farm it can’t be refused), the autorisation is for each hectare, buy or rent extra and you have to apply for the autorisation.

Depending on each Département policy, if you have an existing farm and there is a “better” or “needier” candidate for vacant land, it can be the granting of the “autorisation d’exploiter” which decides who can occupy it; it’s far from uncommon to see people blocked. How this fits in with EU competition policy is unclear.

In my Département, if one diversifies or has a second income that can be enough to preclude the granting of "authorisation" for any more land!

It is also a charter for nepotism and cronyism. Our weekly review has regular tales about people who can’t take on land because of this, even cases where families are leaving it idle because everyone suitable gets blocked, this all administered by a body of farmers that we elect every six years.

I enjoy life in France but am unable to develop the farm as I would like. I have spent the last year or so looking towards Eastern Europe and will no doubt find a much more interesting farming project there. I have no intention of deplacing the family home but am equally sure that it's not worth investing much in France.

When I came Mr Baladur was PM and he had all this in his sights but once he lost out to Jacques Chirac every hope of reform went out of the window! Time will tell if Mr Sarkozy addresses this, he has other matters to deal with at the moment!

Keep your chin up and bon courage,

JC.

re: Lost in Transylvania!

AllyR — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 21:57:50 GMT

Congratulations Stuart and Mrs Meikle. That's great news! 'Hope both are fit and well.

re: Lost in Transylvania!

Isabel Davies — Sun, 30 Sep 2007 09:50:25 GMT

Congratulations - with you and He his-self there's a baby boom around here!

re: Lost in Transylvania!

flash jacques — Sun, 30 Sep 2007 09:00:59 GMT

Glad to hear the radio silence was for all the best reasons, congratulations to you all and keep up the good work!

re: Lost in Transylvania!

Tas Cowboy — Fri, 28 Sep 2007 03:20:20 GMT

Congratulations on the birth of your son Stuart, hope all is well with mum & bub ;-)

re: Input supply

flash jacques — Sun, 12 Aug 2007 07:13:41 GMT

How about precision seeding (Stanhay Dart) basic imported seed to multiply up your own. At 65 kg / ha or even less you would soon get what you need. Taxes etc will be per tonne not € so could be cheapish option. Hardest job will be find clean field?

Nice photos on the admins blog too.

re: Input supply

admin — Thu, 02 Aug 2007 14:10:49 GMT

Just found another fascinating blog about life in Transylvania:

transylvanialife.blogspot.com

re: Hay and straw

2575713 — Fri, 27 Jul 2007 09:30:49 GMT

Hi Stuart, Interesting reading - such a contrast to here in the UK. I was in Ukraine three weeks ago and the crops there were looking good - see www.fwi.co.uk/ukraine for details. Mind you western Ukraine has some pretty impressive soils and good rainfall. Little wonder it was once the breadbasket of the Soviet Union. A big issue for the farming business I visited was sourcing fuel, fertiliser and agchems. They could get them, but often logistics were tricky, such as fertiliser in 50kg sacks - unpalletised. Similarly diesel arriving in a tanker, but only hand pumping to unload it! How is input supply for you?

re: Harvest highlights!

dkemp — Wed, 25 Jul 2007 08:30:17 GMT

Hi its david,

If you have any more highlights - or - lowlights that you want to share please dont hesitate to email me at:

david.kemp@rbi.co.uk

Or if you prefere phone me on 020 865 24073.

Lookinf forward to hearing from you.

re: Harvest highlights!

Isabel Davies — Sat, 21 Jul 2007 09:57:40 GMT

Your lowlights comment sounds familiar...