Rich Harvests

As we go about our business at this time of year we can hardly avoid noticing the sheer exuberance and fertility of the English countryside. On the Plain as in the lush valleys the variety and intensity of our green plant life is stunning. So is the vigour of the weeds in our gardens!

But while we are enjoying the spectacle and anticipating the ripening crops and the harvest that will follow, our farmers are now making their decisions about how our landscapes will look next year. More oil-seed rape? More flax? More winter wheat or maize? Will we see fewer dairy cattle or beef grazing, more sheep, goats – or horses?

With fewer people directly involved with agriculture, the link is now weak between the price of the loaf of bread, fresh milk or a bag of potatoes and the decisions of our farmers. A few of them have been able to ‘diversify’ successfully with farm shops or specialist added value products like yoghurt or cheese. Most are stuck on the treadmill of what their land can produce.

Silent Spring?
Despite intensive production improvements, farm incomes have fallen. Some blame supermarkets. The fact is that since the 1970s, yields of wheat have doubled and almost twice as much milk is produced per dairy cow. The cost has been counted in a decline in wildlife and habitats. The population of skylarks has fallen by 53% and of grey partridge by 87%. There have been major declines in bumblebees, butterflies and brown hare.

But the costs of intensive farming are increasing too. Next year it will cost £325 to grow a hectare of winter wheat, £250 for a hectare of oilseed rape. Fertiliser is the most expensive input, so farmers must work out the yield ability of their land on a field by field basis depending on soil type and condition, aspect and exposure and water. This is serious business. Farmer Giles retired long ago!

Increasingly concerned about food quality and fair trade, consumers have forced politicians to change the basis of support for farming – and asked why it should be supported at all. The answer, in a word, is biodiversity. The farmers created the landscape we love – and now we must recognise the connection between farming, the variety of life and our human well-being. It is about more than food – it is about all the wider benefits humans gain from nature .

Food mountains or country to cherish?
For fifty years farmers relied on taxpayer subsidy for their products. Now the link between subsidy payments and production has been ‘decoupled’. By 2012, farmers will be paid by hectare not by crop – provided certain standards are met. This is called cross-compliance. In future, farmers will be rewarded by the taxpayer for producing public benefits that the market cannot deliver. That means ‘environmental stewardship’. To get payments, farmers must conserve wildlife (biodiversity), enhance the landscape, protect the historic environment and natural resources and promote public access and understanding of the countryside. Food production will get closer to market prices.

This all represents massive change for our farmers. For all of us it is a journey into the unknown. I’ll be watching and listening to see how it impacts on our fabulous countryside and the families who keep it so.

Out of kilter?
The rabbits are unlikely to notice the difference. They arrived with the invading Romans. Then, they were scrawny little creatures that had to be nurtured and fed in warrens. Today they are robust devourers of crops – and they are responsible for more archaeological destruction than anything else. Fortunately, at this time of year, the stoat population rises, too. I’ve never seen it – but it is said stoats dance and mesmerize rabbits before the kill. That’s nature’s way of balancing natural populations. It only works where an animal has a natural predator, without which an unchecked population explosion can cause trouble and danger in our countryside – as with the local badgers. They are beautiful creatures – but they are now out of control and a real problem, especially west of Salisbury.

Making tracks…
July 2nd marked the centenary of the Salisbury Rail Disaster when a boat train from Plymouth, racing to London against a train on the northern, GWR line, went through Salisbury station at 60mph (the limit was 30mph) and overturned into the path of a milk train on the down line. Railways were never the same again, anywhere in the world. Lessons were learned about locomotive design, track engineering, signalling and driver training. It marked the end of train racing – and a 15mph limit was imposed that is still in place today east of Salisbury station.

Most of the MPs in the South West have been seeking to influence the Government as they hand out new train operator franchises. Ministers have changed the rules to allow fewer stops – which means faster running and lower costs. But it is bad news for scores of small stations like West Dean and Tisbury and for the prospect of reopening Wilton and Porton.

I dug out some startling statistics. In the last financial year there were 779,927 train journeys from Salisbury, yielding income of £6.6 million. And there were 95,531 journeys from Tisbury, yielding £0.6 million. Amongst other statistics I acquired, I can tell you that 322 people travelled from Edinburgh to Salisbury and 31 went to Tisbury from Liverpool. Whilst 37,000 people took the train from Salisbury to Tisbury, sadly only 36,697 came back!

Robert Key MP
June 18th 2006