Scots producer blasts fellow farmers

29 December 2000



Scots producer blasts fellow farmers

by FWi staff

A PROMINENT Scottish farmer has used a local newspaper to accuse his fellow producers of not doing enough to help themselves.

Ian Duncan Millar, director of one of the successful meat buying farmer co-operatives, Highland Glen, said farmers were still weak buyers and sellers.

Producers dealing with multinational companies were likely to lose out if refused to co-operate and instead acted individually, he told the Dundee Courier.

“There is no good shouting at the National Farmers Union to do more, when we are not doing as much as we can to reduce our costs,” he is reported as saying.

Mr Duncan Miller said he was astonished that his farm accounted for one quarter of the fertiliser bought by his local machinery ring which has 300 members.

“It covers one of the main agricultural areas in Scotland and yet only a few of its members and not even all of the directors use the opportunity to buy collectively.”

It seems very few farmers are prepared to give up a little independence for the possibility of saving money on one of their main inputs, he told the paper.