Harry’s Farm. Much more profitable to grow - nothing

[Heym SR20]

I started off my career inn Agriculture in the early 1990’s at the time of all the CAP reforms. I went overseas as opportunities were few.

Just been watching this little video on profitability of growing crops. Making a bit over £100 from wheat per hectare. Leaving it as stubble he is getting over £500 in payments from government per ha.

Overall crop production = food production is falling off the cliff and all has to be imported.

How does that square with any of sense. As a country we should aim to be self sufficient in food. Not every food stuff and we will always need to import and export to smooth out humps and troughs and to provide variety.

But when it is far more profitable and much less risky to put the farm into a scheme set up by the previous Tory government it really doesn’t make sense. I can though see why the new government wants to put IHT onto farms so that they can claw some of taxpayers money back.

Just leaving land fallow - huge number of workers and contractors will go out of business.

 

[JockStalk]

We need to eat less meat and dairy to ‘save the planet’.

This is part of the plan. Drive beef and dairy farmers out of business. Achieve nut zero.

 

[nun_hunter]

Just like buying cheap stuff from China. We want to buy things cheap because we can't afford to buy anything made in the UK due to the cost of living and houses. Those who make, grow or sell anything have their raw material cost going up so put their prices up to survive but then no one can buy their things so they go out of business.

 

[Apthorpe]

I started off my career inn Agriculture in the early 1990’s at the time of all the CAP reforms. I went overseas as opportunities were few.

Just been watching this little video on profitability of growing crops. Making a bit over £100 from wheat per hectare. Leaving it as stubble he is getting over £500 in payments from government per ha.

That's sort of an inevitable consequence of mechanisation. Food is very cheap because machinery and other capital costs which permit a high degree of efficiency are very, very high. Environmental payments to farmers are the minimal costs of the choice society made to have the luxury of cheap food and a degree of food security without turning the place into a complete desert.

Overall crop production = food production is falling off the cliff and all has to be imported.

How does that square with any of sense. As a country we should aim to be self sufficient in food.

This is unrealistic. Anyone believing in freedom of movement, EU membership and so on can't adhere to the idea of being remotely self-sufficient in food. If you import people, you'll have to import food. Having said that, at least within the EU, there is the averaging effect, that although small areas, like Britain, the Rhine Valley and Northern Italian plains are very heavily overpopulated, much of the continent is essentially empty.

Not every food stuff and we will always need to import and export to smooth out humps and troughs and to provide variety.

But when it is far more profitable and much less risky to put the farm into a scheme set up by the previous Tory government it really doesn’t make sense.

Almost every economic activity is far more profitable and less risky than agriculture. What makes even less sense is to criticise a business which is receiving even at £500/ha, a gross revenue which doesn't even cover half the cost of capital. To put it into some perspective, the RSPB receives about 150% more than that per hectare for achieving much less, yet it has substantial tax advantages over farmers even prior to Labour's latest assault on the fabric of the nation.

I can though see why the new government wants to put IHT onto farms so that they can claw some of taxpayers money back.

It's not taxpayers' money. Taxpayers haven't paid the capital costs. They've paid for production or for environmental benefits. This argument makes as little sense as claiming it's OK to rob your newsagent.

Just leaving land fallow - huge number of workers and contractors will go out of business.

 

[Heym SR20]

We need to eat less meat and dairy to ‘save the planet’.

This is part of the plan. Drive beef and dairy farmers out of business. Achieve nut zero.

Yes, but we don’t really. All we do is drive the food production to more vulnerable parts of the world - eg Brazilian rain forest and add in all the costs (including environmental) of transport etc. whereas growing food locally has minimal impacts.

 

[willie_gunn]

We need to eat less meat and dairy to ‘save the planet’.

This is part of the plan. Drive beef and dairy farmers out of business. Achieve nut zero.

Let's not forget that Dale Vince of Ecotricity, green energy provider and the Labour Party's biggest corporate donor, is actively pushing the Government to remove meat and dairy from school meals, add tobacco-style warnings to bacon, and to increase taxes on meat to reduce consumption.

Now who do you think might benefit if lots of farmland became available for building solar panels, wind farms, etc?

As ever, just follow the money.....

 

[MarinePMI]

Ag subsidies are just a backdoor government price control scheme. And we all know what happens when price controls are put into place....inflation and deflation of prices.

And we also know what happens when the cost of a loaf of bread goes up by 100%. It's how civil wars start (hot or cold).

 

[Demetrius]

I buy good local food whenever possible.....definitely not cheap food...

D

 

[shakey jake]

We should follow trumps idea and add import tax to anything we import that can be grown here. Food should be expensive. If people can affordd fags at £16 for 20 or beer at £6 a pint. Food should be prided acordingly especially if it comes with fries, coke, salt and vinegar or with microwave instructions.
One of the farms i look after has gone in this scheme, now getting a grant for hedges. Makes more sense than trying to grow decent crops to have a gamble on price

 

[Apthorpe]

Ag subsidies are just a backdoor government price control scheme. And we all know what happens when price controls are put into place....inflation and deflation of prices.

And we also know what happens when the cost of a loaf of bread goes up by 100%. It's how civil wars start (hot or cold).

No. It means some hipster **** who thinks he can bake has bought the local bakery.

 

[willie_gunn]

Remiss of me, but I forgot to mention that Dale Vince also owns and runs a plant-based food company, Devil’s Kitchen.

Now why might he be in favour of removing the compulsion to offer a range of food, including meat and dairy, in schools?

 

[mudman]

The farm I shoot over is farmed very intensively. Large acreage. Two crops, winter wheat and break crop of winter rape. No stubble, no strips or other cover, just the 2 meter hedgerow margin, which is mowed down to a couple of inches every September.

If there was more money in stubble why isn’t the farmer doing just that? (I really wish he would!) The ground is well draining enough to do spring crops.

 

[Taff]

Just like buying cheap stuff from China. We want to buy things cheap because we can't afford to buy anything made in the UK due to the cost of living and houses. Those who make, grow or sell anything have their raw material cost going up so put their prices up to survive but then no one can buy their things so they go out of business.

Try living in NZ your cost of living is low compared to here, no subsidy for farmers world beef/milk prices .
People want Chinese copy’s of products I wish governments would put massive levies on china to make them get there house in order, the problem there is they would not by Nz milk powder then

 

[willie_gunn]

Just like buying cheap stuff from China. We want to buy things cheap because we can't afford to buy anything made in the UK due to the cost of living and houses. Those who make, grow or sell anything have their raw material cost going up so put their prices up to survive but then no one can buy their things so they go out of business.

Don’t worry, as under this Government there soon won’t be any shops to buy anything from.

Warning retail job cuts ‘inevitable’ after NI tax rise in Budget

Retail firms have written to the chancellor to say they cannot manage rising costs and tax bills.

www.bbc.co.uk

With all the major retailers saying that the recent budget is going to inevitably lead to job losses, price rises and shop closures, that cost of living crisis is about to get a whole lot worse.

People buy stuff from China because it is cheap, which is because it is hugely subsidised by the Chinese state and riven with poor working practices. People buy stuff from China because they don’t care about saving the planet, so ignore the huge carbon footprint, let alone the fact that most of what is bought ends up in landfill. People buy stuff from China because we live in a society that wants and expects instant gratification, and people are no longer prepared to save and pay for something better.

China is the country that Starmer is now cozying up to, conveniently forgetting all his pre-election posturing about wanting China’s treatment of the Uyghurs formally branded as ‘genocide’ and their ongoing Human Rights violations in Hong Kong. Whilst Starmer was standing there praising China, two British reporters were bundled out of the room by Chinese officials.

Chinese officials bundle British journalists out of Starmer-Xi meeting

Move came as UK prime minister — who is pitching a visit to Beijing — raised the case of pro-democracy publisher Jimmy Lai.

www.politico.eu

If only there had been a Human Rights lawyer in the room…..

Still, when you’re desperate to find someone….anyone….to invest in your vision or a big state, low growth, economy, I guess principles are something that can easily be put aside.

 

[Foxyboy43]

Hmmm.
Successive governments have undoubtedly succeeded in making this country’s base industry an utter disaster, hindered by a bureaucratic monster.
In truth however much of the blame rests fairly and squarely on the consumer i.e. us. Have a look at the contents of your fridge and check where the fresh foods come from - mushrooms from China; blueberries from Poland; raspberries from South Africa etc. etc…. If we didn’t expect/demand such items pretty much 52/7 the stores wouldn’t sell them. Many other countries still believe in and operate to seasons/seasonality - if not grown locally it is not stocked - period! I well remember the look of disbelief of a fresh food shop worker in France when Lady FB dared to ask for fresh root ginger…..

 

[Klenchblaize]

It's clear we don't have a choice in the matter of our relationship with China, and in consequence have accepted we are 100% reliant upon what they export to the UK. It should therfore come as no surprise that our Government's lips our sealed in the matter of human rights as nicely evidenced by their silence in yesterday's jailing of top Hong Kong pro-democracy leaders.

K

​

 

[Apthorpe]

It's clear we don't have a choice in the matter of our relationship with China, and in consequence have accepted we are 100% reliant upon what they export to the UK. It should therfore come as no surprise that our Government's lips our sealed in the matter of human rights as nicely evidenced by their silence in yesterday's jailing of top Hong Kong pro-democracy leaders.

K

​

Certainly not with Starmer around. He is making existentially dangerous policy choices. We still have a couple of years to make some progress in disentangling ourselves from China. Otherwise, it's goodbye democracy and any human rights, hello authoritarianism.
China is due to invade Taiwan by 2027 - this is not conspiracy nonsense, it is the officially announced and oft-repeated policy of China. They've told us they're going to do it, they're acting like they're going to do it, they're spending enormous sums of money and arming thmeselves like they're going to do it and there is no sound reason to discount it. When that happens, the shock will be profound and global.
In the light of those facts, Starmer's brown-nosing of China at this stage is madness. Even excluding the complete incompatibility of it with Starmer's much self-trumpeted integrity and paramount regard for human rights.

 

[vmaxphil]

Of course, starmer's brown noseing to China, where do you think the money to pay for covid came from?

 

[Apthorpe]

Of course, starmer's brown noseing to China, where do you think the money to pay for covid came from?

It certainly did not come from China.The disease did.

 

[Klenchblaize]

Moving off topic slightly so feel free to shut me up.

I have feeling many simply do not understand how utterly reliant we are on China. Yes, this primarily relates to the import of goods/materials but that is the structure on which or economy is predicated.

K