I went for bad in the end. Although I think it has more do do with a government that doesn't care than farmers replying too much on subsidies. In recent decades UK agriculture has become a shadow of its former self. 

Having read two very good and convincing articles I was also left pondering on which side of the fence to fall, if indeed I needed to fall at all! However, not being one for sitting on the fence for long, I tipped over towards Matthew. As a young person in the industry it is frustrating to hear many farmers moaning that they feel they deserve better. I would argue that this is justified in some cases, especially in the current climate where the impact of disease and the subsequent ‘management’ of it is preventing farmers from going about their daily business as normal. However in terms of agriculture over the last 50 years the impact of subsidies particularly has allowed some farmers to continue in business when many other companies in other industries in a similar state would have failed, or needed to change to continue.

Lack of change is one of the factors that is holding progression back within the industry.

I would move back towards the fence if this debate was primarily talking about technological developments within the last 50 years, which I think have made our supply chains more efficient and our ability to compete on a global stage that bit easier (although, again not without it politics and challenges!), but if we are to have this same debate in 50 years from now (when hopefully I will still be around to comment) technology alone will not carry the industry forward.

In an industry where commodity prices are at rock bottom, yet costs are only going upwards where is the incentive for young people to keep things going? As Matthew mentions, consumers have very little faith in our product, despite the industry doing more and more to try and boost it – where are we going wrong?

50 years is a long time ago and there is no doubt that things have moved forward, but where are the incentives to keep it going? Yes, tradition and ‘way of life’ are positive and important factors but alone they are not enough. If there is little incentive to get into agriculture, I would suggest this is enough to conclude that the last 50 years has left a bad legacy.

 (Age 26)

Yes, the articles were both excellent and I think one thing that can be said is the quality of farmers is as high as ever!

I have only farmed livestock for 17 years, but over that time it has struck me that the farmer is the one that is continually screwed down on price. The insistance by the Government for cheap food means that the supermarkets have their blessing to keep prices down. The price of a fat lamb today is less than  when I started when it should be in reality around the £100 mark to reward the farmer for the time and effort in rearing it. Fortunately, there is a movement for appreciating quality and local provenance which may be our salvation.

Overall I voted "No". Yes, there have been some wonderful technical advances and some brilliant role models and innovators (see FW awards!). However, the political attitude towards a sector that produces vital commodities has diminished and belittled our role over the years to mere park-keepers to be controlled and regulated at every turn. It is probably not the past 50 years that have left a bad legacy for farming, but the last 10 years of red tape.

I'm glad you are finding the articles interesting. As I said on the blog - I found myself reading one and agreeing whole-heartedly and then reading the other and doing the same!

In recent weeks we have had issues raised relating to seeking to portray a more accurate picture of UK agriculture and issues like subsidies. Now we seem to be getting asked to go off on a tangent to debate an issue which is really of little relevence to anything. Judging by what I have read one of the pieces is full of cliches and inaccuracies that make me wonder whether I actually know anything about the UK agricultural industry. 

I am sorry but when I read a phrase like "While farmers throughout the globe face a time of great opportunity, most of the UK farming industry is now too frail to rise to the challenge" my only response is to say 'get a grasp of reality". It may come as a surprise but the basis that a UK farmer has to work from is rather better than the majority have.

Hence, my only contribution to this debate is to suggest that I would just prefer to see rather more factual and researched-based pieces appearing that may actually support the idea of informing people rather than reinforcing misconceptions.

I don't really agree with this Stuart. Nor do i see it as" going off on a tangent" to seek, as you say, an accurate portrayal of UK agriculture if you choose to ignore the past 50 years. And that's 50 years of - guess what - direct agricultural subsidy.

In fact it strikes me that this is an issue of very real relevance, as anyone who identifies themselves as a farmer is immediately met with a series of preconceptions and prejudices based on the popular myths coined in the last 50-odd years.

Yes, the UK farmer is a lot better off than many in the world. no-one would dispute that. But I think the point Matthew was making was that while sheep farmers in the south of New Zealand are abandoning lamb production to get into dairying, and doing it fast, UK farmers are not able to make big investments or changes of direction so quickly, in response to purely commercial opportunities.  

Debates challenge and can change people's misconceptions - it's not having the debate that re-enforces them.
 

Ian, in part you missed my point. I would like to see an accurate portrayal of UK agriculture. I did not suggest anything about ignoring the past 50 years. I found that the article was too full of cliches and sweeping statements to be particularly useful. It is also rather condescending to those who have gone before. A farmer of his day has to play to the rules that are set, be it by market or govenment policy. Today's successful market-led entreupreneur would have been yesterday's successful player of the system. It is also a fact of the industry that not everyone can supply a niche market and most have to supply commodities. The reality is that the majority of farmers have to be price takers, a few try to find a way to take more control. The majority of farmers have had to play the technology game and to produce as cheaply as possible because that was the way the stream was flowing. Many did it very successfully. Were they subsidy 'junkies' or just making sound business decisions in the environment that they were operating. Does this make them anyless of a businessman or farmer?

My main comment was concerning whether this was really worth the debate. Maybe it would have been better to debate what were the most valuable lessons learnt with respect to going forwards. As for your latter point about needing to have debates, if you look back through this forum you will find I am far from an inactive participant. I do try to concentrate on looking forwards and if possible to debate issues that may be relevent to the decision-making environment that we are going to face. If you had seen some historic discussion you would have found, for example, food security and we were a while ahead of Gordon Brown. Is it relevent you may ask, but I would suggest it is because I expect the future issues relating to food production are going to be somewhat different than those of the last decade or half-century. I would not be surprised to find that in 10 years time the least relevent experience of the last 50 years is the last decade! 

What one man sees as as misconceptions and cliches, another man can see as the truth. Yes, individuals take decisions based on the circumstances they are working under - but isn't the question asking us to consider whether on a national scale that operating environment has done us any favours?

I actually think it is something we should be thinking about. We are heading for a review of the CAP and it would good to have a clearer picture about what we want from that (and any future reforms) based on our experiences of the past.

i think its not all bad or good plus points mecinisation has made it easier but at the cost of jobs  how on earth can farmers justify quarter of a million on machinery when prices have been low

the assetts base is good but for how long?

and its not farming now its a business with manegers and companys just doing a yearly cycle do they care about the enviroment or whats going on around them subsidys what  is that?

the goverment dont realy want farmers thats the impresion anyway who is defra do they help or hinder

all the things that have happened  blue tongue foot and mouth  flu virus  does it make farmers pull together ?

no i am not defeatise but where is it going the last fifty have seen progress but since 2000 its been wiped out now prices are rising but then scares come along and wipe it out

Stuart, as usual you make some very sound arguments. 

My viewpoint is that, as is almost always the case, when governments interfere in any industry, with whatever intentions, they usually approach it with certain particular political aims which are not necessarily achievable in the long term, and are usually detrimental to the industry concerned.  Most often they result in merely protracting the inescapable effects of market forces with the result that the industry concerned is more likely to collapse as a result of catastrophic change rather than be allowed to evolve with the market.

At least in farming we have a subsidy regime which is set to continue, albeit on a reducing basis, for a few years yet.  With luck we can have the luxury of time to adapt to the world market.  When SPS came in the pundits were forever harping on that farmers should exclude it from their profit calculations for the farm and learn to exist without it.  Unfortunately for large sections of the UK industry that hasn't been possible and profitability has been so low that most farms are under capitalised and not in any condition to adapt to change.  If we are really moving into an era of global food shortages then that may change, but by and large, the subsidy regimes of the last fifty years haven't done the industry as a whole any real favours. 

Jacobus, I think the point you make abut stability is the crucial one. Agriculture and food production is a long-term business, hence also the sound comment made at the start of this about passing on a legacy to the next generation. Both politics and markets create instability and it is inevitable that food security (availability, affordability and safety) are all going to play a part in any governement's thinking. At the moment the UK more than most European countries is still favouring the free-market, capatalist system and what seems to be its inevitable but unsustainable short-termism (mainly due to the over-simplistic nature of using money as the sole measure of wealth generation). When this is combined with an era of food abundance the net result was inevitable, a move of capital out of agriculture.

What I think we are now seeing is the first signs of serious resource shortages biting at the global level and this will inevitably lead to governmental concerns over food availability (for the last 20 years they have been dictated by food safety issues, predominately as a result of ill-informed tabloid journalism and a still unresolved debate over BSE). I think one can be pretty sure that the government response will be more not less involvement. Hence what I think we should be debating is not the idea of living in a World market without 'subsidies' but living in a World where government is going to be setting a new set of goals.I think we should be looking back at the last 75 years and asking what were the policies that worked and what created the stability that allowed long-term investment to be made in agriculture.

Ultimately it is not going to be the free-market, no government interference model that some seem to advocate because it works in New Zealand (large agricultural resources per capita, a totally export focused country with no worries about food security). When we accept that reality we may then be able to start looking for ways to advise governments (British and European) on policies to create a long-term, sustainable agricultural and rural future. It is the policies of the past and their relevance to the future that I would have prefered being put up for debate rather than another of these over-simplistic yes-or-no type of questions.

Stuart

Stuart:  I do not know if this ties in, but I have been meaning to ask, in your opinion if Eastern European and Russian agriculture operated with the efficiency and input level of that of the UK, would that lead to grain surpluses again?  I have always read and what you say seems to back it up that the land is plenty good, the technology and management of communism is what was lacking.  With all the optimism about high priced grain lasting for years, I think that is an important issue.

My two cents since most of what I know about UK agriculture I have learned in the last 6 months is how can your farmers survive totally in the free market against the likes of the Ukraine, Brazil and even my country when our land is cheaper and we are less regulated?  Whatever you want to call the payments, incentives or subsidies, how can UK or Western European agriculture as a whole compete without them?  Our farm leaders in this country for years have bravely proclaimed that we in the USA can compete with anyone anywhere as long as the rules are the same, but there is no way the rules will be the same.  I think that nations must include food security as a crucial element of national security, and it is foolish to rely totally on imported food.  I suspect that when your subsidies in the UK are added onto the prices you receive, plus your incredibly strong currency, practically nothing can be grown as cheaply in the UK as it can elsewhere........but, it is in the best interest of your nation, I think anyway, to have domestic food production even if it has to be subsidised. 

KF, the second part first. What seems to be forgotten too often is that when farming in a small island (much of which is of a pretty poor quality agriculturally) is that the competition for resources is ultimately much higher. This includes labour and particularly land. You only just have to take land and ask yourself whether 2% return on capital is attractive? Now run this against your land prices, Canada's, the Ukraine etc. Remove the subsidies and commodity production will not make money without sustained price rises, and it will take more than one year to convince capital to move in. To reach a ROC expected by many, say 8%, will need profits to quadruple!!!

The suggestion that farmers should learn about marketing always amuses me, I can never understand how an industry feeds billions without knowing how to sell its prodction! Yes I know that the comment is about becoming more near market but that involves farmers markets, developing niches etc. That is something for the few and I suspect many have decided to focus on what they do best and that is be production. One cannot get away from the fact that the bulk of the industry produces commodities and not products and the UK has developed the yields you see because this is what it has focused on. Marketing may only go as far as making sure it meets the quality standards required. One can argue that farmers have been slow in working cooperatively and selling together (the UK farmers are more independent than their UK counterparts). For a while some products had marketing boards controlling them and at least from a perspecitve of milk one could argue that this did bring a stability that the extreme current market imbalance does not.

The idea that the UK could abandon subsidies and then look to intensify land use (meaning I assume higher-value more intensive crops) falls down simply because it invariably means more labour. The UK is very short of labour willing to work in low-wage agricultural conditions. Bringing in more migrant workers is not going to happen because of the politics. Hence, which way do you go when you cannot pay the going rate  to attract resources, in this case labour.

The whole technology development in the UK has been underpinned by the stability created by post-War agricultural policy. I think you will find that most farmers in the UK will continue with the same systems and look to tailor them to the pressures they face from farming in an urban environment (that is what England now is). The reasons that the industry will survive is due to the legacy left by the technology build-up that was facilitated by the support systems. The last ten years has been hard because prices have been allowed to follow World prices and survival happened because of the support payments. Trying to claim that the new generation can go forward without them whilst also denying that they have at their disposal a legacy of technolgy that simply would not be there but for the UK/EU support policies is simply denying the reality. Having been in the UK agri-education system 15 years ago I am not sure UK agriculture is now populated by a new breed of super managers! I suspect for one thing that if they had to manage their grandfather's farm of 50 years ago the labour organisation and the lack of instant communications would give them a few problems.

As to your first question. Yes there is slack in the system out here that management and technology and capital can utilise. It is not, however, going to be an instant turning on of the tap, the difficulties are too great. Romania is the country I know best and it could probably feed 20% of the EU's total population alone. Not bad for a country of 20 million and falling. It is, however, massively dilapidated (probably as bad as seen elsewhere in the 20s and 30s,  worse in places). There are massive structural problems in the industry because a total collapse does not just happen with farms but it happens with everything. The technology is 1960s but we do have the ability to import western European technology. Romania chose a disasterous land privatisation system in the 1990s and that has put the land holding structure back into the Medieval era. That fact alone will stop the country expanding rapidly. We are working around the issue but the fact is that have to very self-reliant and we do have little of what is taken for granted in the UK, roads, potable water, educated labour, trained farm management, a reliable seed/machinery supplier, a grain merchant, a bank......

I suspect that people reading some of my posts think I am very pro-subsidy. For Romania joing the CAP is a disaster and they should have been allowed to opt out. Here they are just extending the pain. I have always argued that capital grants were needed and not subsidies. The problem is that they are trying both but they have made such a mess of the grant side that no normal farmer can acces them. They should have looked at the post-1945 grants in western Europe for a system that could have worked in this environment, not a massively over-complicated system that was derived from 1990s business school thinking. This failure will slow regeneration further (between the wars it was a major grain exporter). Hence, I do not think you need to worry that this part of the World will depress prices with its production capability. At best it may buy the World enough time to come to terms with the reality of resource per capita decline and expanding population. As an Austrian here said to me recently to get Romania moving is going to take nothing less that a new Marshal Plan!!!

The 50 year Legacy,

Stuart, what you have said is a very good synopsis of what basically has happened in the UK,one overiding fact that must be born is that if needed UK Agriculture could maintain the Nation to a very large extent if World Food supplies did ever get that short.Very unlike the situation in 1942 when we could not grow 2 miilion tns of Wheat per annum now we grow 25-30 million tns or so of Cereals.The other key factor you have not touched on is that there is now an alternative Market for the Prmary crops from Agriculture and that is Fuel.This has added another dimension to the Agricultural Economies of the World and one which could set the price of Commodities more so than supply and demand in wholesale food markets.

I have a friend who is a Geologist on the Oil Fields in the North Sea, he tells me that they can now extract up to 40% more Oil from the existing Oil Fields today and that they are still finding new Fields but that they are not going to pump them instead they are holding on to them.A scenario I think we are seeing Worldwide and who would not,this Policy however is going to affect Agriculture at its bare roots [excuse the bad pun ] and no matter what Govt Policies a UK govt comes up with that will be the bottom line.

I must say your escapade into Eastern Europe looks daunting but surely the Germans as the nearest commercial and Industrial Nation will be front runners to Capitalise on the plight you outline in eastern Europe.

          Of course, we've left a good legacy of farming over the last 50 years. It is there for all to see. I had no hesitation in voting Yes. Along with our allied industries, engineers, manufactures, agronomists, plant breeders, colleges etc., we have transformed agriculture and its production since the 1960's.

           Despite much adversity,  not least of all from our own governments we have come through with our heads held high. Yes I know we have had huge financial support (not all of which has been to our benefit) but so also have coal, steel, cars, ships, trains and planes, and where are they today? I know we have lost 20,000 farmers and farm workers a year since the 1960's but we have had to modernise like everyone else. Farmers have bought or taken over from those who have gone out. Businesses have expanded or consolidated to tackle economic difficulties and we are still here.

            The countryside is looking well. Our young farmers are well capable of taking on the farming businesses for the future, whether they stay at home or face the daunting challenge of starting up abroad. We should be proud of our farming legacy.

I think it’s impossible to answer the question with a simple yes or no.

The first half of the period was very definitely a great success and left farmers with a legacy to be proud of. Starting from resource shortages after the war and arriving in the seventies with the capability to feed the nation was no mean feat.

It’s difficult to argue that this has not been thrown away over the last quarter of a century.

The very policies which encouraged the progress became a hindrance when overproduction resulted in commodities being produced for which there was only one market, intervention storage. This would have been understandable and forgiveable if it hadn’t gone on for so long, cost so much and resulted in disrupting food markets the world over.

To make matters worse, world class technical resources have been lost due to short sighted cost savings. Armies of administrators can never add the value that well focused R&D could. Relying on other countries could prove un-reliable in a more competitive economic environment.

Lord Plumb was in the lucky position to be very active during the first half so it is entirely reasonable and appropriate that he supports the “good legacy” point if view.

Matthew Naylor is making his living today and has travelled with his Nuffield Scholarship so has seen the competition he is up against so one has to accept his point of view.

I myself think that the only legacy that is really important is the one you are going to create tomorrow, so have to come down on the no side.

The average UK farmer is not well prepared to compete in the world market tomorrow, their main hope is that in the past they have been quick to adapt to changes and may well be getting the chance to repeat the exploit very soon.

Bon Courage,

JC. 

After reading through both articles for and against the motion. “Have the last 50 years left a good or bad legacy for UK farming?” I find I have to agree with Matthew Naylor that the last 50 years has left a bad legacy for UK farming.

Both Matthew and Lord Plumb put very strong convincing arguments forward for their case,however the points raised by Mr Plumb, whilst valid, do not apply solely to UK agriculture, the same technological improvements and increases in production have been gained by farmers worldwide.

Matthews article concentrates specifically on the UK and the problems that guaranteed markets and pricing have brought to the industry I suppose the main reason that I support his side of the argument is because I agree almost entirely with his line of reasoning,. UK farmers are subsidy junkies which in turn has made them lazy thinkers with very little idea on what is happening in the world markets, I do not condemn the farmers for that at all, it is the system that has made it that way, they have after all only been doing what any other business would do and that is concentrate your energies towards the area that makes you the most money.

Unfortunately as we move towards freer trade the UK is not in a very strong position to compete in the world market which only reinforces the opinion that the last 50 years has left a bad legacy for UK farming

I certainly find Flash Jacques and Ally to be closer to the Mark with this. I would put the change around about the mid-1980s. I would go for 1987 because I personally think that was the year when several key economic fundementals were changed through a major change in economic ideology.

Of course the response from some quarters is that this must mean that one links the good years to subsidies and the bad to having to operate in a free market. That is I am afraid about the level of the arguement put forward for saying that today's generation have been left a bad legacy. The difference is that the degree of stability in the industry took a fundemental change. The idelogical switch in the UK was greater than elsewhere in Europe because in the main the Continental countries have remained more social in their political ideology. This might just explain why the new generation of UK farmers has to turn eleswhere for their new technology, thankfully many European countries have not rushed to explose their long-term R+D food sector investments to be trashed by exposing them to the vagaries of the free market.

The younger generation are going to continue to benefit from these R+D investments. In the meantime it appears that there is an element of the UK farming sector that is firmly wedded to the idea that their future lies in being fully exposed to World markets and free-market ideology. Fine, but they had better accept that this will mean larger farms and less opportunities as agriculture will continue to go the way most industries have gone when placed in this environment, bigger and more corporate. Owning farmland and having a family farm will be a distant memory. These agribusinesses in the UK will of course be reliant on technology from the Continent or from North America (where the scale and importance of primary food production remains sufficiently large to encourage investment).

Reading some of the comments suggests that there is probably a polarity between the 'yes' and 'no' camps and that is generational. If that is the case I find that most worrying. As I said in the beginning I found the 'no' arguement to be somewhat flawed. It is certainly founded more on rhetoric and less on an understanding of the economic fundementals that create and drive change. Hence my conclusion that its logic will actually end up with the opposite of what I think most younger generation farmers are seeking.

          That's a nice post Jacque and I can appreciate all of it. I feel the worst legacy left by the past 50 years is, in a word, "incomes". Farm incomes are an appalling legacy for continuing in farming but I cannot agree that we are not in a position to take on opportunities as they come up. I find your last paragraph especially interesting, unfortunately, I don't have you and Stuart's experience and knowledge on farming in the world market but I am sure our young farmers can still rise to take on the best.

           There is no doubt that the 1980's was a watershed. Some farms did very well and managed to expand out of trouble and branch into grower groups, etc. and  increase the value of their produce. Others had to consolidate and cut their costs as never before and protect their equity. Certainly, farms around here have been able to sort themselves out and have done a really good job of protecting a good legacy for the young to take on. Despite enormous difficulties we are leaving a legacy of which we can be justly proud. 

Having read both sides of the argument, I can see where both writers are coming from. Coming from a small family farm in Cornwall I have inherited that age old farming attitude that "What goes around, comes around" and if times are tough now, it has to come right at some stage. I belive this is still the case, and with farmers now being asked fuel as well as feed the nation I think the future is bright.

However, there is still a bitter taste left from the past. A government that has repeatedly and pointedly demonstrated it's utter contempt for anyone trying to make a living in the coutryside has crerated, and still is creating, a legacy of mistrust and resentment. Policy after policy designed, or so it woould seem, to burden and shackle the entire industry as our foreign competitors sprint ahead has brought an industry to it's knees. They won't even support the industry by buying UK produced food for the armed forces. Lord Plumb was spot on when he said that the advances in efficiency demonstrated by British agriculture over the last 50 years would be celebrated in any other industry. So why aren't they in agriculture? Why is it that agriculture is the only sector in which it is politically incorrect to make a profit? And as soon as a farmers does scrape a living together he's branded as lazy, money grabbing and greedy by the media?

I have travelled and worked on farms in Canada, Australia and New Zealand and in all these countries farmers and the countryside they look after is celebrated (I'm not biased but I thnk the British countryside is far more beautiful than the praries of Manitoba) but here the countryside is full of strange backward folkes who go "ooh argh" alot. In Australia they had concerts for farmers caught up in the drought. I didn't see any concerts for farmers who lost crops and stock in the floods of middle Britain.

Now, I have no intention of leaving the industry I love. It has been my life since since day one and I am confident it will be my life for as long as I can swing a spanner and steer a tractor. BUT, make no mistake about it, this governemnt has got some serious ground to make up if our industry is going to thrive and keep up with the rest of the world.

What an interesting thread and I really do not think I can contribute anything except to say that I have learned that one must never underestimate the ability of young people to change things.

Over the years I have read the words of some very clever people who have made forecasts about the inevitability of this or that, rarely do they get it right in either direction or degree.

Life 50 years ago was good when I was young. It is better to day now that I am old.

I am grateful that I can read the words of people such as Stuart and many others, they are able to analyse the various data logically and their knowledge and enthusiasm gives me hope!

Peter, glad to know one's efforts are appreciated. For me it is valuable to have the opportunity to write as it keeps my hand in and my brain functioning on the broader issues. As you have probably noticed it gives me the chance to blow off steam and to avoid sinking from the weight of the frustration of working in such an impossibly daft environment as I do! Stuart

Stuart Meikle:

I certainly find Flash Jacques and Ally to be closer to the Mark with this. I would put the change around about the mid-1980s. I would go for 1987 because I personally think that was the year when several key economic fundementals were changed through a major change in economic ideology.

Of course the response from some quarters is that this must mean that one links the good years to subsidies and the bad to having to operate in a free market. That is I am afraid about the level of the arguement put forward for saying that today's generation have been left a bad legacy. The difference is that the degree of stability in the industry took a fundemental change. The idelogical switch in the UK was greater than elsewhere in Europe because in the main the Continental countries have remained more social in their political ideology. This might just explain why the new generation of UK farmers has to turn eleswhere for their new technology, thankfully many European countries have not rushed to explose their long-term R+D food sector investments to be trashed by exposing them to the vagaries of the free market.

The younger generation are going to continue to benefit from these R+D investments. In the meantime it appears that there is an element of the UK farming sector that is firmly wedded to the idea that their future lies in being fully exposed to World markets and free-market ideology. Fine, but they had better accept that this will mean larger farms and less opportunities as agriculture will continue to go the way most industries have gone when placed in this environment, bigger and more corporate. Owning farmland and having a family farm will be a distant memory. These agribusinesses in the UK will of course be reliant on technology from the Continent or from North America (where the scale and importance of primary food production remains sufficiently large to encourage investment).

Reading some of the comments suggests that there is probably a polarity between the 'yes' and 'no' camps and that is generational. If that is the case I find that most worrying. As I said in the beginning I found the 'no' arguement to be somewhat flawed. It is certainly founded more on rhetoric and less on an understanding of the economic fundementals that create and drive change. Hence my conclusion that its logic will actually end up with the opposite of what I think most younger generation farmers are seeking.

Stuart

It is interesting that you think there is a polarity between the Yes and No votes and that it could be generational I assume that you feel the younger generation have gone for the No vote and lean towards free markets whereas the older generation have migrated towards the Yes vote.  If that is the case I wonder where I sit, as I class myself as older but firmly in the No camp. Could it be that I live and farm in a country that has no subsidies and see the benefits and efficiencies that a free market policy brings? I could also be motivated by self interest as free world trade would bring me financial gains.

The Debate however is not about a free market policy v subsidisation; it is “Has the last 50 years left a good or bad legacy for UK farming.” For the first half of the last 50 years anyone farming should have found it easy to make a good living and if they didn’t they really should not have been in the job, food was in demand and prices were high, (this is where subsidies come into the debate the policy had worked, production was up and at that point subsidies should have been phased out). From the early 80s onwards food was over supplied but farmers were still paid to keep on producing, putting the over production into intervention stores, it is hardly surprising that the tax payer who had to fund these payments started to resent farmers.

The guaranteed price regime also led to farmers having no concern for their produce beyond the farm gate with no control over marketing and losing out on any gains that could be had from being involved further up the supply chain.