DAVID RICHARDSON
DAVID RICHARDSON
A walk in the glorious
spring sunshine made
it feel good to be a
farmer again –
until news from Tony
Blairs No 10 summit
came through
Easter weekend reminded me, briefly, why I became a farmer. Walking round the fields with my young dog, bathed in glorious sunshine, I was buoyed by the spurt of spring growth in autumn-drilled cereals. Even those late drilled after sugar beet looked so much better than at this time last year. And this time there were only a few bare patches that had been too wet to plant.
Spring crops, too, were full of promise, having been drilled at the right time into good seed-beds. The spring beans, drilled in early March, were emerging evenly. While the sugar beet had all been drilled and sprayed within five consecutive days into tilth better than any we had experienced for several years. We owe that to the sharp frosts we had just after Christmas.
Even the field boundaries were a joy, with clumps of primroses and a scattering of cowslips peeping through the greenery on many a bank, lighting up the budding hedgerows in which songbirds twittered as they planned their nests. Even my dog, still a playful 10-month-old, was relatively well behaved. A nice spring shower would have been welcome, but it is days like that, the sort money cant buy, which persuade me to carry on farming.
It was only when I returned to the office that I came down to earth with a bump. "Wheat off combine could be £50/t", screamed a headline. "Blair summit a damp squib" proclaimed another. So I sat down and read DEFRAs official summary of that much trumpeted meeting at No 10, held to discuss the Curry recommendations – the recommendations which Sir Don had insisted should be adopted in full and not cherry picked.
The governments response was to announce "a series of consultations on proposed policy changes". I hope I may be forgiven for suggesting that I thought the Curry commissioners had done a lot of consulting already. Yet here were Mr Blair and Mrs Beckett initiating more talk, more debate, more focus groups, of course involving a wide range of "stakeholders" to chew the same fat all over again. None of the actions they announced involved the injection into the industry of much more than pennies. Decisions on the real money required were delayed until the autumn.
Specifically, they agreed a Food Chain Centre be set up under the Institute of Grocery Distribution. But anyone with half a handle on the food industry was aware that all the plans for such a body had been laid long ago. And putting the IGD, which represents food retailers, in charge of an official body to oversee the entire food chain might be likened to asking the wolf to look after Little Red Riding Hood.
An Industry Forum, or talking shop, is to be set up by the DTI to spread best practice and sustainability throughout agriculture. In other words it probably foreshadows more regulations.
Meanwhile, DEFRA has committed itself to "a new approach to regulation to ensure changes are delivered fairly and effectively". So, thats all right then.
There is to be a new Agricultural Development Scheme targeted mainly at "collaborative ventures". The last three schemes provided grant aid to the entire farming industry totalling £7m. I can hardly contain my excitement. After all, averaged across every registered farmer, a further £2m, or even a little more, could add up to almost £20 each.
There are plans to set up a national network of "new" demonstration farms to spread innovation and good practice. Apparently, they will be based on the "New Zealand model". You may find it interesting that the New Zealand scheme was based on the British network of LEAF Demonstration Farms after representatives from New Zealand had visited this country a few years ago.
Moreover, LEAF has nearly 50 demonstration units already set up around the country showing integrated farm management, the adoption of which, along with organic farming, is another of DEFRAs objectives. Repetition, or what?
But the most astounding proposals to come out of the No 10 summit were those "to address concerns at the risks of disease from meat and other food products smuggled into Britain". The aim is to "reduce" (not eliminate) the risk. To do so the government will make a risk assessment of the threat; try to achieve greater inter-agency enforcement; strengthen intelligence; increase powers to search baggage; liaise with Europe; increase public awareness; and explore the use of detector dogs.
So, 14 months after the start of the biggest and most destructive outbreak of F&M the world has ever known, in which nearly 10m animals were slaughtered and as a result of which individuals and the nation lost billions, we are just getting around to talking about measures which most other civilised countries adopted years ago.
If past experience is any guide it will be several more months before effective action is taken, if then. Certainly when I came through Heathrow several weeks ago I saw no evidence of any attempt to increase public awareness, let alone any of the other measures under discussion. I find it almost impossible to believe that a British government could be so incompetent. And still they blame farmers.