It’s sometimes a good thing to challenge conventional thinking – and it’s even better if this can be done with some sound, logical reasoning behind it.

I was set to thinking this earlier this week when reading the annual Outlook report produced by Andersons, the farm consultants which, as ever, takes a close look at the various sectors of UK agriculture and how they’re likely to perform in the foreseeable future.

The section on combinable cropping took a hard look not only at the economic situation, but also at some of the automatic assumptions we have been making in this sector in recent years.

While the firm always manages to find some positive points – and manages to avoid painting the unremittingly gloomy picture which can leave the reader in despair – there is no avoiding the fact that the arable sector is facing a good deal of uncertainty at a time when profitability is being squeezed.

With world grain stocks currently standing where they are, there’s little likelihood of any boost to prices coming from a sudden upturn in demand – or any perceived shortage. So it’s only really been the slide in the value of sterling which has protected UK farmers from the fairly dramatic slump in global grain prices which have been hitting other parts of the world so hard.

And it’s a bit of a sobering thought to realise that without the serious dunt to the value of the pound which we’ve seen over the past 18 months or so, wheat prices would have been sitting at around £100 per tonne.

To see any further improvements in grain price there either needs to be a significant upturn in demand, or a further steep drop in the value of sterling – neither of which, as the report stated, can be relied upon.

Of course, another way of maintaining profitability is to cut costs – and while we’ve all been keen to do this for years, the need is growing ever stronger as margins are squeezed.

We’ve generally adopted this approach on an across the board basis, carrying it out over the whole of the farm, with the underlying assumption being that every acre and every last square yard, with the exception of what must be left to meet greening and other requirements, has to be cropped.

But the report pointed out that yield variation across the farm as a whole and even across different areas of fields undoubtedly points to the likelihood of considerable underlying differences in productive capacity.

And, radical thought here, it pointed out that those areas which repeatedly show lower yields are likely not only to be making a loss, but pulling down the overall performance to a level which might be questionable.

Indeed, the report suggested that up to 40% of land on farms is regularly producing wheat at an insufficient yield level to cover growing costs. On other crops, this figure has been put as high as 60% of the land – placing a huge handicap on the areas which are able to wash their faces.

So, the report concluded that after a number of years' worth of yield data and a knowledge of the land, the assumption that all areas should inevitably be cropped should be reviewed and assessed in a logical manner.

Armed with the sort of information we can now get with current technology, it would be possible to knowingly commit to using only the parts of the farm which would produce sufficient yield to cover the actual costs of growing the crops.

While the suggestion of a U-turn on the maxim of pushing every acre to it limits might seem surprising coming from the wider advisory and consultancy sector which has, after all, probably played its part in encouraging us down the production maximising route, I’m pretty sure that it’s actually something most farmers will have been doing for quite some time.

While we have all bemoaned the necessity to comply with greening regulations, criticised having to take up the fallow option and in the not too distant past been highly critical of the need for set-aside, we have probably all been using these tools – perhaps unwittingly – to focus profitability on the areas of the farm which have been up to it.

Going back even further, our forefathers did exactly the same – and while their mental calculations probably weren’t based on a handful of years of yield monitoring, they were probably based on generations of experience of which bits of the farm could be profitably cropped – and which were best put down to grazing or other enterprises.

Of course, it might be possible to address some of the problem areas with some capital expenditure. Drainage might provide a solution in some yield-limited areas and rabbit fencing or tree-felling on others, but again it would be crucial to make sure that any improvements in yield would outweigh the significant costs incurred by such work.

Though money might be saved by simply not cropping the areas of underperforming land, inevitably something has to be done with it, especially if the area surpasses that required to meet the minimum greening requirements.

Entering into wider environmental agreements might be one route, but another option might be a return to more mixed farming enterprises.

However, while such an approach offers a range of benefits, it has to be said that adding a livestock enterprise comes with a range of challenges as well.

I remember asking one large-scale Borders farmer, who dabbled in both crops and livestock, why his neighbours seemed to stick to the arable side alone he, demanding anonymity, replied that they liked their holidays too much!

But while keeping stock might not be for everyone, a publication released by the National Sheep Association earlier this year not only extolled the numerous virtues of the sheep’s 'golden hoof' on arable units, but also outlined a number of ways in which such an enterprise could actually be conducted by a third party. This allowed rental income to join the likely benefits to soil structure and improved land fertility for future crops to be gleaned without the hassle.

Such a move could even be used by new entrants, with flying flocks on rented land, allowing them to get their feet on the farming ladder.

Furthermore, by getting some stock and grass back into the rotation and giving the land a rest from the constant demands of arable cropping there could well be a whole range of benefits to the soil structure and fertility from this traditional 'break crop'.