Archive Article: 2000/08/04
4 August 2000
Peter Hogg
Peter Hogg farms in
partnership with his brother
at Causey Park Farm, near
Morpeth, Northumberland.
Half the 450ha (1100-acre)
heavyland farm is in crops,
mainly winter wheat, barley
and oilseed rape, plus a few
potatoes
THE British Society of Plant Breeders has pushed the royalty rates payable by farmers up by between 7% and 35%. They say the reason is because more farmers are home-saving seed.
Well thats just great isnt it. Following their rather strange logic it would appear that if every farmer used nothing but home-saved seed then the plant breeders would have nothing to do, no wages to pay, no trials to fund. In fact, no costs at all. However, they would have an income of £50m. That beats winning the Lottery!
Take wheats, for example. Hundreds of varieties are produced and marketed, but most fail to make any substantial improvement. The industry is over-sized and royalties are simply perpetuating that.
Prince Charles said in a speech a number of years ago that some people in agriculture had replaced a certain amount of need with a certain amount of greed. John Edmunds, a trade union leader, used stronger language in a televised speech when he described obscenely highly paid directors as greedy beggars. Ladies and Gentlemen of the BSPB choose your title. In the meantime we shall continue to grow varieties that attract no royalties. Has anyone got any Igri for sale?
The set-aside has been ploughed, worked and rolled and is now home to a flock of at least 200 lapwings. We have done a terrific job of controlling predators over the past two years with amazing results. If only some of the misinformed welfare lobbyists would listen to the argument in favour of a "managed" countryside.
The potatoes received their first blight spray on July 14. Full-rate Ripost Pepite (cymoxanil + mancozeb + oxadixyl) was used, a mixture of systemic and protectant fungicides, and they now look healthy and full of promise.
Harvest started for us on July 27, with our first and worst field of barley. It had received a low dose of glyphosate 18 days previously and • will not comment on the yield. As they say, things can only get better.
The combine is out of the shed at Causey Park where Peter Hogg has some strong thoughts on royalty rates.