Making money from a smallholding

Latest Articles

Making money from a smallholding
Page Previous 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 Next

Downsizer Forum Index -> Land Management

Author

Message

crofter

Joined: 11 Feb 2007
Posts: 2252

Posted: Fri Mar 02, 07 11:23 pm Post subject:

Rob R wrote:

It may be for nothing, but there's still competition.

True. But in a year or two I won't be surprised to see people offering a grazing "service" to comply with GAEC.

Green Man

Joined: 23 Jul 2006
Posts: 5272
Location: Rural Scotland.

Posted: Fri Mar 02, 07 11:26 pm Post subject:
In a year or two I'm hoping farmers will be paid a fair price to produce food to feed our non self sufficient population on local food again.

crofter

Joined: 11 Feb 2007
Posts: 2252

Posted: Sat Mar 03, 07 10:10 am Post subject:

Cho-ku-ri wrote:

In a year or two I'm hoping farmers will be paid a fair price to produce food to feed our non self sufficient population on local food again.

British farmers can never compete against south american beef or grain from Kazakstan. Supermarkets will continue to ruthlessly drive down the prices they pay to suppliers. I can only see a future for very large and very small producers, large because they can benefit from economies of scale and small because they can target niche markets.

Nick

Joined: 02 Nov 2004
Posts: 34535
Location: Hereford

Posted: Sat Mar 03, 07 10:50 am Post subject:

crofter wrote:

Cho-ku-ri wrote:

In a year or two I'm hoping farmers will be paid a fair price to produce food to feed our non self sufficient population on local food again.

British farmers can never compete against south american beef or grain from Kazakstan.

Now? No they can't. With a government that said, you know what, being more reliant on homegrown stuff is more important than cheap food, and we'll tax Latin cattle and US Wheat and New Zealand lamb, they can compete.

Do we, the public, want that? It'd mean better security, worse relations with other bits of the world, and much larger food bills.

crofter

Joined: 11 Feb 2007
Posts: 2252

Posted: Sat Mar 03, 07 11:06 am Post subject:

nickhowe wrote:

.... With a government that said, you know what, being more reliant on homegrown stuff is more important than cheap food, and we'll tax Latin cattle and US Wheat and New Zealand lamb...

Do we, the public, want that? It'd mean better security, worse relations with other bits of the world, and much larger food bills.

The public wants cheap food. Most people don't even know what they are eating or care where it comes from. Everybody shops in a supermarket, even a lot of downsizers. Government will never tax imports, even if a government was elected which *wanted* to do so, the WTO would consider it illegal. It probably doesn't matter what the public wants, globalisation is more powerful than public opinion.

RichardW

Joined: 24 Aug 2006
Posts: 8443
Location: Llyn Peninsular North Wales

Posted: Sat Mar 03, 07 11:36 am Post subject:

crofter wrote:

Government will never tax imports, even if a government was elected which *wanted* to do so, the WTO would consider it illegal.

Er nearly all imports have some sort of duty / tax (ok some are very low) just not on food. You try importing stuff from abroad & wait for the duty / tax bill & its not just VAT. The gove had a huge database of products with diff code for diff rates of duty. Looked at doing some importing a few years back when I owned a PC parts distro & we checked outr all the codes. If we used one code the tax was huge but another code had almost no duty 7 both descriptions fitted fine.

Justme

Last edited by RichardW on Sat Mar 03, 07 3:58 pm; edited 1 time in total

Rob R

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 31902
Location: York

Posted: Sat Mar 03, 07 1:57 pm Post subject:

crofter wrote:

Cho-ku-ri wrote:

In a year or two I'm hoping farmers will be paid a fair price to produce food to feed our non self sufficient population on local food again.

It's attitudes like that which I faced ten years ago going into the industry- it can't be done. Well I stick two fingers up at them, supermarkets, 'commercial' meat buyers & the lot. I've heard lots of ideas from 'experts' that there is one particular way to do things (grain feeding etc.)- there is never only one solution. If we didn't have half the rubbish brought about by improper practises, then 'real' food wouldn't have the added cost that it does.

See the Superfarms topic for my thoughts on Mr Hawkins & his ideas. Decent food is what man has always eaten, modern pseudo-food is a tiny blip in human dietary evolution, IMHO. I'm sure it's not a niche, but industry structure is set up to try & make it so. And as long as the average age of producers is pushed up, where will new ideas come from?

crofter

Joined: 11 Feb 2007
Posts: 2252

Posted: Sat Mar 03, 07 10:11 pm Post subject:

Justme wrote:

crofter wrote:

Government will never tax imports, even if a government was elected which *wanted* to do so, the WTO would consider it illegal.

Last year I imported a container load of plastic pipes. It had to sit in Immingham docks for 24 hours until my VAT payment cleared but there was no other duty to pay. I should perhaps have been more clear and said something like "Government will never impose punitive import taxes on food"

crofter

Joined: 11 Feb 2007
Posts: 2252

Posted: Sat Mar 03, 07 10:16 pm Post subject:
I read your superfarms thread, Rob and I agree with what you write. I am not saying "it can't be done" just that global economics will force farming in this country to change, some will adapt quickly enough to survive, others will not.

Rob R

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 31902
Location: York

Posted: Sat Mar 03, 07 10:36 pm Post subject:

You said British farmers will never compete... That is a line I have heard a lot. I know the implication was perhaps that 'we will never compete on a price basis as long as the economic & legislative imbalance occurs', but I think it worth adding to that; I don't think that British farmers should be looking to compete at all. There will always be rubbish coming in, but if we chose to compete with such people by producing something even more rubbish, then we deserve to go out of business.

crofter wrote:

I read your superfarms thread, Rob and I agree with what you write. I am not saying "it can't be done" just that global economics will force farming in this country to change, some will adapt quickly enough to survive, others will not.

There is also a point to be made that global forces would have encouraged change much earlier, rather than forcing it later on, had the UK industry not been set against it with quotas, subsidies and other barriers to change that have held us back all these years.

tahir

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 45685
Location: Essex

Posted: Sun Mar 04, 07 8:23 am Post subject:

Rob R wrote:

Back you 100% on this. There's no earthly way we can compete with prairie cattle or other commodity products. We have to accept that and move on.

tahir

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 45685
Location: Essex

Posted: Sun Mar 04, 07 8:33 am Post subject:

Rob R wrote:

modern pseudo-food is a tiny blip in human dietary evolution, IMHO. I'm sure it's not a niche, but industry structure is set up to try & make it so. And as long as the average age of producers is pushed up, where will new ideas come from?

Not sure that it's as small a blip as you'd expect, but yes there are no structures in place to help younger people to enter the industry, most are designed to perpetuate the status quo (or in some extreme cases Phil Collins).

We need more younger people coming into the industry but with the ag tie system and the amazing land prices that leisure activities and housing offer it's not exactly an easy market to enter.

There's a 117 acre residential farm down the road from me �1.5m with an ag tie, how could you make it work? I think I know, but I couldn't buy it cos of the ag tie.....

The ag tie system is complete and total b*ll**ks and needs to be replaced by something that actually encourages new farmers into the industry.

wellington womble

Joined: 08 Nov 2004
Posts: 15051
Location: East Midlands

Posted: Sun Mar 04, 07 8:40 am Post subject:
I think when people say british farmers can't compete, they ought to specify on price Of course that's how most people judge food, but comparing Rob's beef Tesco's is like comparing a ford fiesta to a Ferrari. Totally differnt product - I bet no-one buys both on an interchangable basis. Agree about the ag tag system, too, andhave found myself in a simililar position.

Nick

Joined: 02 Nov 2004
Posts: 34535
Location: Hereford

Posted: Sun Mar 04, 07 8:48 am Post subject:

wellington womble wrote:

comparing Rob's beef Tesco's is like comparing a ford fiesta to a Ferrari. Totally differnt product - I bet no-one buys both on an interchangable basis.

Many people do, actually.

You need a Ferrari for going to the golf club, for long trips, for when you want to show off. You need a Fiesta for popping to the shops and parking in town.

People buy better food when they want to show off, or have the bank manager round for dinner (Jesus, I've slipped into an episode of George and Mildred...). Tuesday tea time? Instant mince is just the ticket!

tahir

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 45685
Location: Essex

Posted: Sun Mar 04, 07 8:51 am Post subject:
That's true, a lot of people see organic etc labelling as a status thing

	Downsizer Forum Index -> Land Management	All times are GMT Page Previous 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 Next
Page 4 of 5

View Latest Posts