Low cost lamb warmer takes little time to make

Made it Myself ideas for early January

LAMBING is just around the corner, and this lamb warmer will come into its own. 

Instead of a static box that's away from the ewe, here you move the heater into the pen. 

The barrel holds the heat and when the lamb gets strong it can walk out and get a feed from mum. 

The creep gap stops ewes from getting in. 

Heat is controlled by adjusting the height of the lamp. 

You can also fit a timer switch so it goes on and off. 

It's so cheap you can make as many as needed.

SAFETY FIRST
Before switching on get someone to check your wiring:
1.   to see the power is connected to the correct terminals
2.   to make sure the cables are routed out of reach of sheep so they don't chew
3.   is connected to a circuit breaker 

Other equally simple ideas for January:

*  Waste oil drainer and collector

*  Slurry pipe handle

*  Large spanner holder

The current issue, #111 Vol 28 issue 3  carries 41 workshop projects

The cover story:

Irish farmer has fitted two cameras on his front mounted mower. Turning onto the road is now 1000% safer.

The finance article:

Getting a financial grip:  Managing farm borrowing

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Best wishes

Mike Donovan, editor & publisher 

www.farmideas.co.uk   website updated Dec 24, 2019

http://farmideas.blogspot.co.uk

BBC food documentary targets livestock farming

‘Meat: a Threat to our Planet’: A travesty of a documentary

BBC's Liz Bonnin was shocked at what she saw

This programme shown on BBC 1 on Nov 25 2019 featured Liz Bonnin. Liz is a clone of TV investigator Stacey Dooley. They  are both highly concerned with global issues and travel the world looking for and exposing them. The Guardian commented on a recent Dooley programme "The sight of celebrities making weepy 'personal journeys' towards understanding poverty has begun to feel more and more crass, especially where it overshadows the people whose experiences they’re meant to be understanding in the first place."
In ‘Meat: a Threat to our Planet’ Bonnin travelled round the world to showcase the impact to the world environment of intensive livestock units.  From the run-off of manure;  the consumption of feed imported from Brazil and the consequent destruction of the Amazon rain forest; the use of fish meal in animal feed which has decimated stocks of anchovy and sardine - she linked meat production with global devastation. Her answer was to stop eating meat.

Liz Bonnin missed the target 

Bonnin could have told us that over 90%
of US beef comes from feedlots, while in UK it is about 7%

She wanted to make the case for giving up meat on the grounds of the environmental damage done to the planet. While David Attenborough shows what a beautiful and fascinating place this plant is, Bonnin shows the damage to the earth from intensive livestock. Her problem was that she made the case through emotion: in a cattle feedlot she says “it makes me sick to my stomach”. In the plane she manages to hold back the tears. She would have had far more impact if she told her audience that 97% of the beef produced in the U.S. is grain-fed feedlot beef, while just 3% is grass-fed*. She could have mentioned that 72% of British beef is fattened on grass, and explained to her British audience that beef production has two phases, rearing and fattening, and the labels explaining how the meat is produced.
In this BBC programme facts were far less important than emotion. The idea was to drive home the message that meat is destroying the planet - “we may not be here much longer” - and the answer is to go vegetarian, which Bonnin claims to have done herself. For life? Ever and ever? Or just till the fuss dies down.
The programme failed to mention that the present size of the US beef cow herd, which today numbers 31.7 million, is significantly less than it has been. Numbers have been in decline since 1968 when they reached a peak of 45.1 million, and the last time they were as low as 30 million was in 1962, when the cattle were in fields not feedlots. Feedlot beef is shown to produce lower quantities of greenhouse gas, both  because the animals have fewer days getting to slaughter weight and their digestion is faster and less gassy.
Liz Bonnin might find the production system not to her taste, but, given these figures, to blame the sector for global warming seems a stretch.  

Where are the answers?

Brazilian agricultural expansion is clearly out of control. Rain forest destruction needs not only halting but the forest needs reinstating. There is a solution to slash and burn farming, as we featured in Volume 22-2  AUG - NOV 2013, but who takes any notice? Global organisations as well as TV directors are interested in shock horror which raises huge funds from a public raised on a diet of alarm.

Global management of rain forests 

There is a solution to the Amazon rain forest. In the same way that individual farmers will manage their land to suit their own purposes, countries with rain forests will manage their territory so that the politicians remain in power. The world needs to apply both carrot and stick to the rain forest countries to steer them to value their natural resources, especially rain forests. 'Carrot' in terms of developing their industry away from the production and processing of farm produce, helping their economy move away from agriculture. 'Stick' in terms of sanctions based on the way they manage, or fail to manage, the resources under their control. If the USA can apply sanctions on Iran for the developments they are making to their nuclear programme, we can surely do the same on Brazil for their Rain Forest management. And the developed West could allow similar controls on the resource which it uses and misuses...

Amazon rain forest being cleared for grazing cattle

Animals have been around longer than feedlot cattle

The Bonnin answer of imploring people to give up meat is no solution. The evidence is sketchy. First, the herd figures don’t coincide with rates of global warming. Second, there is no explanation of the fact that this planet has been home to millions of cattle, sheep and other ruminants long before the discovery of oil. The phrase ‘horsepower’ is no accident. Horses were used to transport people, goods, turn pumps, and with oxen tilled fields and powered agriculture. They all burped and farted, and their numbers were huge. Yet the growth and following decline in their population doesn’t appear to have influenced the earth’s climate.

Meat price is the control mechanism

If Bonnin wanted to blame global climate change on meat consumption she needed more facts and less rhetoric. There is one way to force a decline in meat consumption and that is to increase the price. The price will go up if supply is reduced. Supply will be reduced if the costs of production increase. Growth promoters and in-feed antibiotics reduce the cost of production, so globally stopping their use would be effective. Planning permission for livestock expansion, controls of livestock farming, there are a million and one ways to prevent the industry expanding - should that shown to be necessary. But Bonnin wasn’t looking for answers, only sensation. Her’s was a drama fabricated from partial facts and images. There is a lot that farmers can do to be more friendly towards the environment, but this programme unfortunately provides no incentive for them to act.

*  According to Dr. Dale Woerner, assistant professor with the Center for Meat Safety & Quality at Colorado State University.

In 2004, Bonnin was locked in a giant kennel along with MPs Paul Burstow, Evan Harris and Ivan Henderson and actress Liza Goddard, BBCNewsround presenter Lizzie Greenwood and DJ Becky Jago in a stunt to launch the annual RSPCA Week to raise awareness and funds.

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Current issue #111 Nov 2019-Feb 2020

Farm safety; 'Made it Myself' beef housing; farm borrowing interest rates

A double camera system means you can see traffic approaching from both left and right. The idea comes from Niall Murphy who farms in Co Armagh, N Ireland. If you're into beef, pages 39, 40, 41, 42 show what you can do with crash barriers. Pg 26 has an article ‘Reasons why the beef situation in Ireland is critical’. The financial piece on 21 makes sobering reading about interest rates, which have never been so low for so long.

Information and bright ideas are going to be crucial in future years as the transition period leaving the EU progresses.

Water bowser puts out crop fires

NFU Mutual warned us last week of the dangers of crop fires. Ripening 

cereal crops are getting dry and the extreme sunlight is ready to ignite some

tinder dry material. 

Their warning reminded me of a neat idea which Geoff, a Midlands farmer

with land close to dense housing estates, prepares each season as soon as 

crops look vulnerable to fire, whether caused by sunlight or youths with matches.

His home made 3000 litre water bowser for the sprayer has a stainless tank 

which came from a nearby brewery that was being rebuilt. It mounts on a single 

axle chassis with good tyres. There's a Honda pump fitted and a long hose,

an on-off valve, and a jet end. 

When the corn ripens the tank is filled and the bowser parked in the yard for

a quick get-away when the alarm sounds. Geoff is generally on the scene

well before the brigade who have people to collect and much further to travel.

The fire is often out by the time they arrive.

This is one of 50 cost cutting Bright Ideas featured in the Vol 19 - 2 issue of

Practical Farm Ideas published in August 2010.  

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Oxford: Gove tries to please everyone

FARMWORLD  Practical Farm Ideas  Issue 26-4  Feb - May 2018 

More from FarmWorld will  be posted in due course

Oxford: Gove tries to please everyone

The two January conferences in Oxford run concurrently and Michael Gove was the first environment secretary to make the short dash between the events. Oxford 2018 was an important stage for the start of a new farming era, and Gove provided his audiences with forward looking policies which will take over from increasingly discredited present EU policy. At the OFC he provided big farmers, big agri, and their advisors with some comfort when he extended the transition period for subsidies to 2024 (Liz Truss had extended the 2019 exit date to 2022), and then telling those ‘real farmers’ at the ORFC meeting at the Town Hall that he will not only be introducing new environmental directives but will also be driving a change in food production systems. “It is about the health of our families, our nation and the costs placed on our National Health Service”.

Gove is a master wordsmith. You can see him revelling in the shape and sound of his delivery, and it makes the task of any reporter that much easier when the words hang together like his do.
Of course the key question is if it makes sense as well, and the people in both conferences largely seemed in agreement that it did. They have come to realise that Defra after Brexit will be very different. In fact, the CAP in EU27 will be very different after Brexit - something forecast by some EU agri officials just a few days after the critical vote. The money won’t be there like it has been. 

A glance at the subheads of his speech has the reader wanting more:
The age of acceleration - what does it mean?  am I missing out?
A state without the means of change is without the means of conservation - Gove says if farming can’t make change then it is never going to improve the lot of the birds and bees.

The Secretary floated the idea of a Department of Wellbeing linking Heath and Defra, and told his audience that Health and Defra were talking more than ever to find and exploit common ground.
“Ours is the first generation where more people succumb to non-communicable conditions than infectious diseases. The rising dangers are obesity, diabetes, coronary failure, cancer and deteriorating mental health, and diet plays a part in all these conditions.”

He was critical of the CAP in both conferences, claiming that the present system drives up land prices “creating a barrier to entry for innovative new farmers and entrenching lower productivity”.
He wants to make the system much easier, with schemes “simplified to the extent that any farmer can complete an application in a working day. Starting at the computer after breakfast the whole process has to be able to be finished by six o’clock, when it will be time for a well-deserved pint.”

He was very critical of the present farm inspection system currently with RPA, Natural England, The Animal and Plant Agency, Environment Agency and the local authority all requiring information with much overlapping and little if any co-ordination. The inflexibility and fear of penalty means inspection of precise field dimensions, location of trees and so on “in a near-pointless exercise in bureaucratic box-ticking”.

On trade he said “we are confident in building a new economic partnership with the EU that guarantees tariff-free access for agri-food goods across each other’s borders. We have a deficit in agri and horticultural produce with the EU27. Irish beef farmers, French butter and cheese producers, Dutch market gardeners and Spanish salad growers all have an interest just as, if not more acute, than Welsh sheep farmers or Ulster dairy farmers in securing tariff-free access between the UK and the EU.”

Under the heading ‘Paying for what we value’ Gove said “Take the vital question of soil health. Min or no-till approaches, which require less expenditure on inputs and keep more carbon in the soil, are both economically more efficient and environmentally progressive.” and went on to say that the CAP’s focus has led to “decades of damage” in the form of soil erosion which costs the UK economy around £1.2bn a year. Out of the CAP we have the chance to reverse “this unhappy trend”.
Gove’s writing abilities - he was a journalist in Aberdeen prior to parliament - came to the fore in each section of his speeches: “I am moved by the beauty of our natural landscapes, feel a sense of awe and wonder at the richness and abundance of creation, value wild life as a good in its own right, admire those who work with nature and on our land, respect the skill and passion of farmers, growers, shepherds, stockmen, vets and agronomists who provide us with high quality food and drink, and I want to see them prosper.” He has the happy knack of creating a quotable quote in virtually every paragraph.

The press view of Michael Gove, over a video link to the press room. The OFC listened politely but unsure how to repsond. Afterwards he went to speak to the REAL people and his comments were greeted with whooping.

At the OFC
The political and economic climate remains predominant at the OFC, and while Michael Gove gave plenty of information, Ted McKinney, the top man from the USDA managed to reveal far less. We learned of his Irish and Scottish roots, love of Britain and his support of the special relationship. He got tetchy when chlorine washed chicken was mentioned, saying the practice hasn’t been used for more than a decade. Where McKinney failed on facts, Prof Dieter Helm from Oxford, made up for them in abundance. Helm, who has been advising Defra, gave an excellent fact filled presentation which put some of the farming facts in context. Flanked by NFU posters which reiterated the oft-repeated message
“Farming meets 61% of the nation’s food needs and forms the bedrock of the UK food and drink sector which contributes £112bn1 to the nation’s economy and provides 3.8 million jobs.  Farming makes a significant economic contribution as well as caring for our iconic British countryside and putting safe, affordable British food on tables across the country.”

The Oxford professor spelt out the realities of UK farming outside the EU, but concluded there are lots of reasons for being extremely cheerful about the future of farming.

The Prof says there are two things of real importance to farming. 1. the understanding and translation into policy that we can’t go on depleting the farming environment. 2. Brexit means the end of the CAP and farming covers 70 - 80% of the UK land. Benefitting the natural environment means changing the course of direction, and the proposal of a joint policy for farming and environment into one will, Dieter Helm believes, be very beneficial. Natural Capital has become the most important driver of policy, and the idea is clear to farmers because it is what their work is all about, for it’s what nature gave us for free and what farmers use for production. The depletion of the assets of water, land, soils, air jeopardises the future.
On trade Dieter explained that agriculture is very small in relation to the rest of the economy. UK agriculture output is £9bn, which is approximately 0.7% of GDP. The CAP subsidies are £3bn. In addition the sector has other advantages and implicit subsidies: the special inheritance tax deal; the red diesel deal; a special business rates arrangement; it doesn’t pay for the pollution created in the way other sectors are forced to do, and it does not pay for the consequences of the wider environment. 100 years ago agriculture was where economies were at but today they are extremely small at least here in Britain, and the net contribution, after subsidy, is miniscule. Helm recognises the scale of the food and drinks industry, but points out that the two are separate. Many countries have a big food sector with little or no domestic production (eg Swiss chocolate, Italian coffee? ed).  Helm says this is a fact, not a criticism, but one which is relevant to any discussions and decisions taken in Whitehall. 

Negotiations with the EU27
Unlike popular belief, the EU and USA are part of a very protectionist trading framework, and the market which really counts for Britain is the EU. Without that market the trade negotiations are the most important part of the negotiations with the EU27. 
The ending of Pillar 1 payments, Dieter says, is inevitably going to happen. But nobody so far is talking about the capitalised losses - such as a decline in the value of farm land - which Helm believes is sure to happen “it’s basic economics”. This will put farms that have borrowed heavily against their asset values in some risk. He told the conference he was recently interested in buying a farm on Exmoor, the asking price being around £5k /acre for poor rough grazing which has a very low earning capacity. He believed the value is inflated by subsidy, and if it were removed the value would drop considerably.
He says the present system of farming subsidy provides public money for private goods which conflicts with the usual system where it is public goods that are supported. Helm agrees that Pillar 2 payments provide for public good, but not in an efficient way. People other than farmers should be able to bid for environmental projects on farmland.
Pollution: in other sectors if you cause pollution you are required to pay the cost. In farming, he said, there’s a different notion which says that farming has to be paid not to pollute or damage the environment. Hence stewardship schemes that help reduce the reduction of birds, insects and wildlife. 

The future of farming.  This is an area where there are lots of reasons for being extremely cheerful. It is the turning point where we have the end of the disastrous CAP in sight. CAP has not served the environment well, or farmers.  Land values will normalise to reflect yield.

Practical farming
The conference moved away from farming politics in three sessions on Jan 4. The first was an innovative farm extension service that has been running in East Africa; the second and ingenious way of identifying points on the globe using a code of just three words which sounds impossible but has the backing of $millions; doing the Hands-Free-Hectare, the well publicised development which they have been working on at Harper Adams University.

WeFarm

This is the world’s largest knowledge-sharing network for small-scale farmers, lets farmers connect with one another around the world to solve problems, share ideas and spread innovation. Farmers can share crucial livestock and crop knowledge, request creative low-cost farming methods, or ask questions relating to any type of agricultural input or output — without having to leave their farms and without needing internet. Utilising the latest machine learning technology, WeFarm’s service works both online and over SMS. Knowledge shared on WeFarm can help farmers to produce higher quality product, increase yields, gain insight into marketing pricing, tackle the effects of climate change, source the best seeds, fertiliser and loans, diversify agricultural interests, and much more. The free service allows farmers in East Africa to share info via their mobile phone SMS connection - no need for broadband. The example was given of a farmer finding grubs destroying a maize crop.

More than 100,000 farmers now use the service across Kenya, Uganda and Peru, with more signing up daily. Investment is led by LocalGlobe, founded by former Index Ventures partners Robin and Saul Klein, and the scheme bolsters the fast-growing UK agtech sector.
Said Kenny Ewan, CEO says “Our mutual belief in the value of peer-to-peer knowledge and shared commitment to creating sustainable initiatives for farmers through the latest technologies – are sure to produce great results.Approximately 500 million small-scale farmers around the world provide over 70% of the world’s food. However, up to 90% have no access to the internet and they are often isolated and lack access to even basic agricultural information and new ideas. With the world’s population projected to grow from 7 to 9 billion by 2050 and climate change an entrenched reality, increased pressures on the global food supply chain will only persist. Farmers and businesses without access to problem-solving technologies and data are at risk of being left behind. By sending a free SMS, farmers can receive accurate answers to any agricultural queries. The service uses machine learning technology to connect incoming questions to those users on the system who have the most relevant knowledge. Topics discussed on the network range from how to stop baby chicks from dying to where to find a market to sell onions.

Considering it’s ‘off-grid’ nature, end users have used the service a huge amount; sharing more than 15 million pieces of information. In 2015 WeFarm was part of the Wayra UK accelerator in London, which supported the business in its growth trajectory.

What3Words  

This is a location service which pinpoints any global location using a code of three words. Farmer’s son Chris Sheldrick, the company CEO, explained that he and the W3W team have created a virtual grid of 3m by 3m squares across the whole world, with each having a distinct three word code which can be recognised and identified by a mobile phone app. The trios of words are assigned to the 57 trillion or so 3x3m squares around the globe. The small size of each square means people can be directed to the front of a building rather than a vague post code, and this occurs in every country. The front of a building will have one What3Word code and there’s another for the side or rear. The words are in English but random, which means that mistakes entering them will not result in a nearby place but are obvious. Once entered into the phone app directions are produced in the same was as a Sat Nav. Except the destination is far more specific. Farmers can use it to locate a gateway or specific shed and instruct deliveries or visitors to the three word coordinate.

Testing it on the location of our farm near Llanboidy (https://map.what3words.com/tooth.polished.recorders)  produced a map showing only the lane and the streams, no buildings, house, hedges or other features. Pinpointing the house or shed needs knowledge of the yard area.

However the person using the three word code tooth.polished.recorders  would be taken to a point somewhere very close to the house or yard. It’s a million times better than the post code.
Sheldrick adds: “We see our service being most useful where current methods of describing location (e.g. postcodes or ZIP codes) don’t do the job well enough or don’t do the job at all — but of course it has applications as a preferred alternative even where the existing solutions do a decent job, but perhaps less precise/customised than w3w.”

Chris’s farming background underlined the problems of finding places and directing contractors to fields which can be some way from the home farm. Remembering three words is considerably easier than using GPS coordinates.

The service has wide applications for taxis, deliveries, emergencies and just pinpointing a meeting place in Hyde Park for example. In farming it has the potential to identify field gateways, sheds, wet patches in fields, areas of weeds such as blackgrass, the location of a sick cow in a field… and many others which can be thought up.

Lunching at OFC

Both Google’s Open Location Code and TomTom’s MapCode offer novel grid solutions which do much the same thing as What3Words, but perhaps in a less refined way. Post codes are by no means the only grids available, thought they are the most commonly used as they are in daily use and easy to remember. The main requirement is that they work reliably and with a variety of different systems. W3W is limited to iOS9.0 or later on iPhone, iPad or iPod and also with Android. The service is free for certain users but for others there is a charge.

Hands Free Hectare  

Harper Adams engineering lecturer Kit Franklin introduced the conference audience to his baby and explained that the guidance methods are based on drone technology. The budget for their first crop harvested in 2017 was £200k, and the equipment on the tractor was around £10k.  Kit asked why it is that an annual subscription to a guidance system can cost £14k.
The second crop has been planted and they are hoping for straighter drills, improved yields which compare more closely with those published by AHDB in their lists.
“When we drilled our spring barley earlier this year, the tractor was a bit wavy and so were the drill lines. We’ve had six months to develop the system and we’ve seen improvements which will improve field coverage and ultimately yield. The tractor was still a bit wayward when turning back into the field, but once it’s on the line it was really straight with pass to pass cover greatly improved.”

Oxford REAL builds its fan base

Conference Manager Nessie Reid said: “We are delighted to announce the ORFC 2018 programme – packed with practical farming know how and debate ranging from Brexit to systems change, to wildlife friendly farming.

The plenary showed delegates the extent of this 6 stage conference. Colin Tudge explained how in the last 20 years farming has come to realise the limitations of science.  Helen Browning, head of the Soil Association, also was a speaker. 

“Industrial agriculture is one of the largest contributors to biodiversity loss and climate change. There has never been a more important time in the history of humanity to implement farming systems that not only provide us with fresh, clean food, but which also support soil health, our water and the biosphere. I believe the ORFC is a collective beacon of optimism for envisioning and working towards a bright food and farming future.”

With over 700 farmers and people from across the industry registered for the two days, organisers coped well with the numbers and though Oxford Town Hall appeared busy, it was a pleasant and friendly crush.

Most farmers said they had done some pre-planning so they knew where they were going. The multi-stage programme was well organised, allowing people to follow their most interesting topics through the day. The variety of topics is best shown by the programme from 4pm on Day 1: Main Hall - Whatever is happening to the world’s insects?  Assembly Room: Post Brexit farm support, how should it be governed. Old Library: What we eat and how we eat today; Council Chamber: What animals want: learning and delivering welfare science; Long Room: Sticking at it; St Aldates Room: Farming, renewables and diversity - can it be a win-win? Christopher RoomDelivering diversity at farm scale. Multiply this programme by the 7 main sessions over the two days and you can judge the impossibility of giving a meaningful review.

The ending plenary looked at the event in the round. Founder Colin Tudge said that before the first one he was told it was not realistic. At the time all serious farming research was done by academics, and farmers’ experimentations were dismissed as uncorroborated and lacking evidence. Today the same detractors are competing for funds from Farmer Innovation groups.

Tudge is sceptical about the Gove promises on environment and reform of policies, and Martin Wolf of the Financial Times told the ORFC “nothing in the Gove programme couldn’t be done with the UK remaining in the EU”.

Allowing these two pilgrims to sing 'God speed the farmer' was a brilliant break from the agenda

The conference mood remained at high pitch as they heard a superb rendition of God speed the Farmer and, at the end, the hall was coached to ’Sing John Bull’. Nothing like some community singing!

Facing up to the Challenges

Facing up to the Challenges

Brexit is just one of a number of challenges facing farmers in the next few years. Farmers have the choice of listing future problems, analysing what they may mean, and then planning for the future - what ever that may bring. Or else they plan to go on pretty much as they have been and don’t see the point in planning for an uncertain future. 

Delegates at the winter conference on Nov 15 of Worcester based agricultural accountants Ballards were given a presentation by Practical Farm Ideas editor Mike Donovan who told them that a head in the sand approach is unlikely to work too well over the next few years. The signs of change are just too great.  Mike told the delegates “It is a racing certainty that Brexit will result in changes to the trading relationships in food and agri products with European countries. Of course we don’t know as yet now what these will be, and it may well be many months before anything is decided. But the chances are that farm economics will become tougher for many farmers.” 

The packed hall had farmers, and accountants, fascinated in the detail of methods to improve farm efficiency -  agricultural productivity 

He went on to point out that the Brexit trading relations with the EU are just one part of the uncertainty. Another is the direct payment subsidies which make up half of UK farmers’ income. Once out of the EU the UK farm support will be directed from London and all the signs are for a major reduction. The price of oil, together with interest rates are further major issues which will impact all farmers, whatever their enterprise or efficiency.

Mike was explaining the contents of this slide - all practical ideas which make farm work easier, cheaper, safer

Drill down and there are other additional challenges: farmers will face continuing controls over inputs: products like neonics and glyphosate, recently given a five year reprieve - a subject in itself - are both under a microscope which is being operated by the public and politicians with limited knowledge and others, like antibiotics and other products may well be more closely controlled. Livestock regulations are very likely to change. Housing cattle and access to outside loafing areas, ducks being given access to water for swimming and splashing… it’s a dense and growing minefield which the farmer will have to negotiate. 

What should farmers be doing now, in this time of uncertainty?

Advisors all tell farmers they need to become more efficient. What does this mean in practice?  For decades farmers have been led to think efficiency means investment, new machinery - a new tractor and plough which gets more work done in the hour.  Farmers with ambitions and helpful bankers will go ahead and make sure their farming is bang up to date. Others will resist the lure of efficiency and be happy with the way they are doing things at present.

Mike went on to explain that farmers have improved efficiency without spending a fortune. His slides showed a great many successful adaptations and home made machines and implements. 

* a cheap pick-up fitted with 650mm tyres that run at 9ps. It is a great substitute for the ATV with the slug pelleter and is used for many jobs.  

* an in-field calving box which makes a better job calving a 250 cow suckler herd outside. Making it easier to secure the cow means reduced calf, and cow, losses. 

* cluster flushing done with a system that was home built ten years ago has massively reduced mastitis - one slide shows the herd’s annual NMR summary with zero mastitis cases in a 140 cow herd. It cost £2k to make. 

* using worn-out Astro-Turf for cow tracks.

* installing vent pipes in grain is like putting in pedestals into a full grain store

* converting an old dumper truck to a self propelled hoe for sugar beet - and many other possible applications

* a hitch that fits the front of the Manitou handler

* converting an old grain trailer into a batch crop dryer

* security locks for a Land Rover Defender with Ifor Williams canopy

* the Farm Ideas workshop miracle - using candle wax as a releasing fluid. Heat and apply a candle and the wax finds it’s way between the rusted parts

* making a removable link box for your ATV

* silage is covered by tyre mats made by bolting 6 x 3 rows of tyres together

* how to wash a field water trough. Keep them really clean and give the cattle uncomtaminated water

Farming with biology. 

Soil loss pictures. Cover crops; direct drilling; home built direct drill based on Bomford cultivator; crimper roller

Farm Safety needs a total re-think. 

We now work iin the most dangerous industry there is. 30-40 people killed annually; 15,000 have injuries that require a hospital; Pictures show a  disabled young farmer’s wheelchair ramp to get into tractor; a home designed power step to lift a disabled driver into cab. Positive pictures: a handler for dual wheels that means they get used when they are needed; orange beacon on an ATV; garden designed into a child’s play area; trailer safety brake; front mirror looks down the road; ATV link box stops flip over. 

Today’s interest rates allow farmers with the right set-up access to capital. Last week I met a farmer who that day had fixed a £1.5million loan fixed for 12 years at 2.5%. It sounds like cheap money - yet the interest is going to cost nearly £40k a year, so he’s looking for a return of £75k. That’s not going to come from replacing new kit for old.       

What can Mr Average Farmer do? 

Improving the outcome of tasks - which can often be achieved with some simple adjustments to procedure and machinery. Many advisors fail to recognise this. They front up innovations such as the new mini robots before they have been used commercially, and with no economics and figures attached to them. Professors and others compare them with robotic milking parlours without saying anything about the huge differences. The only thing they share is the word robot. 

The advice is to search out and apply great simple ideas. The funds at risk are incredibly small. Mike mentions the effects of aerating grassland, using the one he built in 1988. A 30% increase in grass production by year 4 from a machine which cost £250 to make (say £1,000 today) and costs no more to tow around than a roller is a no-brainer as they say. Yet very few farmers have taken the initiative and made one for themselves. And that’s the problem - 90 per cent of farmers will only make changes when they see everyone else doing it. The simpler the idea, the longer it takes to get used. 

The presentation went well, and the email in thanks 

Hi Mike

Thank you so much for coming last night. It was great to meet you and the feedback on the talks has been fantastic. I hope you got back safe last night.

I will have a check with the venue regarding the box of cards and let you know.

In the meantime, I would really like to keep in touch and hopefully meet up again.

Thanks once again for a fun and informative talk.

Best Wishes

Steve

Steven Jones BSc (Hons)

Business Development Director

Ballard Dale Syree Watson LLP

Tel:      +44 (0) 1905 794504

Fax:     +44 (0) 1905 795281

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EU Farm Ministers meet in Tallinn

Looks like the EU will play hardball on Brexit

Last week I was in Tallinn, Estonia. The country has been in the news because it now holds the european presidency, a role which each member country has for a 6 month period. It puts the spotlight on the country and ministers gather for informal meetings and some from the international press get the chance to meet and talk with them. 

Having been selected I went, not for the ride but to get an impression of Brexit from other EU countries, and also see something of Estonian farming was a useful experience. Maybe I could pick up a ‘Made it Myself’ idea from a farm visit!

It was clear that some EU member state farm ministers have a real concern about the EU farm budget after Brexit. The Greek minister said "my main concern is that the CAP budget will be deprived of some €12bn a year. It's unlikely this deficit will be made up, the chances are substantial cut-backs in payments to farmers." Like many EU countries, Greece also exports more food products to Britain than it imports, to the tune of €200m/yr. These exports rely on tariff free status, and if an agreement of free trade is not made, would soon be substituted by those from other mediterranean countries, particularly Turkey.  

Modern dairy with 3,500 milkers set up by Finnish business

Abandoned collective farms are numerous

The main concern from Ireland was the declining value of £sterling which was already hitting their farms with lower prices. Commissioner Phil Hogan said UK withdrawal would cost the EU €26bn (this figure is clearly crucial in determining the size of the financial settlement and difficult to calculate, hence the discrepancy with the Greek minister’s figure) and the farm support system would have to change. At present new EU members such as Estonia get far lower payments than others, because farms were getting little or no support when they joined. Support has increased under rural development schemes, but making payments more equal (harmonisation and convergence) is a major goal. 

Hogan and the Commission set store on farm support being concerned with risk management, but he curiously said that pillar 1 direct payments played an important part in this. The EU crisis reserve fund has not been mobilised since 2014.

Marginal sheep farm prospering with EU support

Housing blocks prevail 

The UK is an important EU food market

Nobody, other than Greece, was going to admit it, but the UK is important for the EU. Neither did anyone point out the shortcomings of area payments as a means of farm support. Their aim was to focus on the UK’s refusal, before other trade issues have been agreed, to fix the financial settlement or divorce bill; agree to an Irish border; and also agree to the free movement of people from the EU to the UK.   

Slick answers for the press

Once again the Commission skated over all the difficult issues raised by the international press. The use of illegal insecticides in poultry farms in Holland, Belgium and Germany, and maybe other countries as well was said to be criminal fraud and a case for public health, and not a farming issue. The EU embargo on food exports to Russia - which has a border with Estonia and other post soviet states and so has a considerable effect on their trade - was equally brushed aside with statistics showing Estonian milk production was higher now than at the start of the embargo, and in any case the EU has a ‘unified approach’ so the embargo remains as long as Russia is occupying Crimea.  Slick answers which failed to address the real problem - of poultry farm inspection standards in the countries caught out, and the real damage of the Russian embargo to farming in Estonia and other border countries. 

Phil Hogan spent time talking about milk, and reported that the market had recovered from the 2012 price collapse. EU output was increasing and world demand increasing, and farm gate prices were looking good. The sales to Russia had been replaced by other countries, and Russian agriculture was growing. There was no mention of the dangerous yo-yoing of milk prices and how easily the circumstances for another collapse can be created, other than to say that farm price volatility can be addressed with various EU actions with income stabilisation using tools of income averaging over a 3-4 year period as well as the development of futures markets. 

Journalists and ministers allowed an hour to talk

Ireland's Brendon Gleeson (rt) and his Danish counterpart

Commissioner Phil Hogan takes press questions for 30 mins 

Conclusion

The UK is not the flavour of the month in Europe, and it was not surprising that nobody from Westminster was present. The meetings were, as always, difficult. Half the national farm ministers failed to wear their name tag, despite the strict security controls. The meeting was accompanied by a stand-up buffet, and it was evident that the intention of some delegates was to avoid too much contact with the journalists. UK farming minister George Eustice should have been there to argue the case for the UK’s position. The 27 other farming ministers will have a say on the negotiations and some, perhaps, could be reminded that the UK’s position is understandable and far from unreasonable. 

I was lucky enough to get a question to Phil Hogan, and asked if at the outset of the negotiations there had been any over-arching agreement from both sides to play fair and not damage farmers’ incomes in their neighbouring countries. His response was that the UK needs to address the three issues - the divorce bill; EU travel freedom; the Irish border - before anything can go ahead. A response which sounded to me like “we’re playing hard ball”. 

Addendum:

In an article in yesterday’s  Sunday Times (Sept 10, 2017) headed The EU Wants May’s Total Surrender - I Should Know’ the Greek former finance minister Janis Varoufakis said he believed M Barnier has a mandate to wreck any deal which advantages Britain. Barnier wants the UK to unconditionally promise everything the EU asks for, effectively forcing London to spend time and energy negotiating for the right to negotiate. Meanwhile, says Janis, the media cheerleaders are denigrating UK negotiators and reversing the truth, belittling Mrs May and her team and deploring their ‘lack of preparation’ with their favourite put-down ‘they have not done their homework’. He says this is exactly the methods employed when negotiating with Greece over their deficit, and he is very concerned that Brussels and Berlin might succeed in damaging Britain in the same way they succeeded in inflicting long term damage on Greece. 

Janis Varoufakis thinks it unlikely Britain will get a sensible negotiation with Brussels. It will be total capitulation, bad for Britain and also Europe. He thinks Britain should make the EU an offer it can’t refuse such as an off-the-shelf deal such as they have with Norway for a minimum 7 year period by which time these negotiators, together with the current crop of politicians will have retired. The second option is the unilateral withdrawal from all negotiations which leaves Brussels to come up with a realistic offer over free trade. This could be accompanied by an offer of immediate British citizenship for all EU citizens in the UK, and we can then see how the 27 behave. In the article Janis says he believes the UK should learn from his mistakes. Brussels wore him down until he capitulated, and he says we should not do the same. 

Where’s the NFU pre-election farm campaign?

Where’s the NFU pre-election farm campaign?

Last week Theresa May did a major U-Turn. Her plans for elderly care, while clearly sensible in the eyes of many, including elderly home owners were going badly wrong and had been dubbed the ‘dementia tax’. The objectors won the day and so the PM, renowned for her tenacity, changed her policy. It was not worth the time and effort to tough out. The run up to polling day is a politically sensitive time when sectors dependent on government funding become vocal. There can, for example, be few hustings where health is not raised. Education, national security and care for the elderly are similar. If the promise is not in the manifesto the next best is to have one extracted on the Today programme.

Like health, the far sector relies on government funding, yet has remained strangely mute. It is also a sector that’s hugely affected by Brexit.  Half farm income comes from the EU. Sales of UK farm goods to the EU are protected. Brexit puts all these at risk.

Why has the NFU side-stepped the opportunity to force statements and decisions? Is their silence a reflection of their traditional loyalty to the Tories? Are they cowed by the fact that so many farmers voted to leave the EU? Farmers need to know the honest truth - is their £3.5 billion subsidy going to be reallocated elsewhere? 

Looking at the nfuonline.com website you wouldn’t know there was a general election going on. 

The main Press Centre page - designed to provide journos searching for a farming story - carries the headline is ’NFU disappointment at another cut for dairy producers’; ‘NFU applauds Co-op’s move to back British farming’; ‘Farm income figures highlight volatility’. The only issue which farmers are urged to engage with their politicians is neonicotinoids and how a ban would affect their farm. Under ‘Campaigns’, their lead is Back British Farming, described as the NFU’s public facing campaign designed to build support and a “call to arms for the food and farming industry and government”. 

No mention of a General Election. Or that farming is the industry sector which is likely to see the greatest change post Brexit. Or to tell members the period before an election is the crucial time when political candidates are forced to listen, and respond. Days before polling cannot be wasted by lobbyists as well as candidates. Here is a time when farmers can seize the chance to get the conservative party to open up and provide some insight into their thinking about agriculture. The fact that farmers have remained largely mute allows politicians to interpret their silence as an admission they are happy with what has been said. Yet as we know, nothing has been said for farming post 2020. The PM remains tight lipped and there seems little progress in negotiations since the election was announced. 

There are not too many days to go. Farmers might have expected their representatives to have been less passive over this past month. Is there time for them to partly rectify this and make some demands as to the future of their industry?

There’s still time for farmers to make themselves vocal at election hustings. 

“What is the Tory/Labour/Lib Dem/Ukip farming policy?”  “Are you going to a member of the party which will hang farmers out to dry?”  “What’s your personal view of farm subsidy?” “farmers need answers that go beyond 2020 and have been given nothing by any of the parties contesting this election.” 

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