IS Scottish farming facing its worst financial crisis in a lifetime?

Considering how much total farm income has dropped - which could be around 25 to 30% in almost every sector - then we are in difficulty.

Compound that with the horrendous cold, wet conditions on the west side of this little country over the past six weeks, then there is little wonder discussions round farm kitchen tables and offices are being held, in order to find ways of surviving this unexpected downturn in TFI, which is wiping out any hope of covering costs, let alone leave any margin!

I penned these thoughts only some 14 days away from the longest day and with the highest May rainfall for many years at 4.5 inches, many cattle are still not out to grass or have been out and brought back in again, on more than one occasion. It certainly does not bode well for keeping up spirits in this farming business.

Let us hope that by the time you read these comments, those 20plus degree temperatures that are being enjoyed in the south will have come up to Scotland which will certainly make us all feel a little more optimistic!

If all crops, particularly Scotland's largest crop, grass, starts to grow more vigorously, it will undoubtedly help all stock recover some of the lost growth suffered over the past six weeks.

Next week will be the Royal Highland Show, which is the UK's largest farming event, and, of course, our most important shop window for every aspect of Scottish farming.

Unfortunately, following my earlier remarks, many of the machinery and livestock equipment stands will not be reporting record sales, and the promotional bodies such as QMS might just be coming in for some producer wrath, as farmers need to vent their frustration on someone - or it could also be aired at the beef, lamb and pork procurement firms with stands which are mostly coupled to a supermarket!

Hopefully, the weather will be kind and that anger will perhaps be reduced somewhat, because the dead-weight producer price will have risen a little, before the Highland opens, no doubt to help relations between producer and processor!

With prime cattle leaving farms back at the value it was in late summer 2011, the frustration for farmers is exacerbated, particularly regarding beef, because the consumer is seeing very little benefit in her shopping basket.

Without a doubt, the show rings will be the focus of attention for many. It is a pastime that we Scots seem to enjoy - the challenge of winning that red, or more importantly, red, white and blue rosette. We call it marketing.

There is, of course, the other aspect where we meet old friends and make new acquaintances. I can also tell you that there are many overseas visitors attending as we are hosting two groups during the four days, one from Ireland and the other from Iceland.

Since my last comments we have been across the Irish Sea to retrace some of our steps of 50 years ago when we first visited this country of friendly people.

The catalyst for this visit was the desire of my better half to visit Balmoral Show which came at the end of a most enjoyable week on the Emerald Isle.

After embarking at Larne we headed right down the east coast to south of Dublin, through pouring sleety rain, for the week-end, but, like most farmers, we like to fit in a bit of farming from time to time, and this was no exception!

With the temperamental weather, one day wet and the next dry, it was easy to surmise why there was an abundance of lovely green grass, but very little livestock to be seen grazing.

Silage grass, on occasions, was battered flat to the ground with heavy rain. Fields, particularly in the south, are very small which leads to the paddock grazing system which they practice.

I was surprised to learn that the average farm size is 32 acres, hence the reason why 75% of farmers have off farm jobs, as do, in many cases, several other members of the family, which makes for part-time farming at all hours of the week, holidays and weekends.

One of the reasons for our visit was to try to find out how the Irish can produce beef at values somewhat below ours.

Some of the things I learned are certainly not eligible to print in this column but there seems to be two main aspects of how it is done.

Firstly, it is not their prime source of income and secondly their SFP, now BPS historically, has been more than twice the level that we receive in Scotland, and it will continue to be, after the current reforms.

Then there is the third reason - the Dublin government certainly looks after its farmers and they have literally milked Brussels for every penny that was available for many years.

It seemed to me that the attitude coming out of the Doil in Dublin, compared to Westminster, was further apart than day and night.

On the milk front they are certainly gearing up to increase output which is currently running some 10% ahead of last year.

With the removal of quotas the message is, pour out the milk, our processors will find a market for it and I can tell you where they see the market for both beef and milk products - the 64 million people in GB, which is their number one customer that they are intending to exploit.

Before we headed north we visited the Key-pac feed-lot which housed 1300 cattle on a well managed 750 acre unit. Cattle were housed on both slats and straw yards, fed a TMR diet. The stores were sourced both direct from farms and through the markets.

After arrival at the feedlot, they go through the same protocols as here, the only real difference being they do not have passports, just a sheet of paper for every batch of cattle with movements done electronically.

Boards in the auction markets have more information than here, with both TB and Brucellosis' latest tests, plus the number of movements.

Balmoral Show, now only in its third year on its new site of the former Maze prison, had very few permanent buildings up yet but it did have some of the largest marquees that I had ever seen!

The surface is all hard-core, except obviously, for the judging rings and horse jumping areas. Car parking is all hard core, but the road infrastructure is non-existent for entry and exit causing massive hold-ups for traffic.

Attendance was 30,000 per day over three days and in size and scale it could be about a third of the Highland. The stock were good with the same enthusiasm for showing as here.

I managed to find a gap at the judging ring between the Charolais and Blondes and my Scotch accent caught the attention of three other farmers whom I would say were in their 40s, so the craic was soon non-stop with a question and answer session going both ways.

Here again one aspect emerged - of the 10 Charolais leaders in one class, eight out of 10 were from part time farmers, and 10 out of 11 in the Blonde ring had other occupations such as truck drivers, joiners, the building trade etc.

It was a very different situation from what we have in Scotland but, who knows, maybe one day will come when we have to become part time farmers.

After being home for a few days, we set off to York for Beef Expo with three farm visits organised on the first day, which was attended by some 300 put into two groups.

For me, the highlight of that day was a visit to JSR Farms on the Yorkshire Wolds where I have to say we saw one of the most impressive herds of suckler cows I have seen anywhere in the world. There were 250 Stabiliser cows with calves at foot.

The information on docility, fertility, calving ease, cost of keeping the cow, feed intake related to live-weight gain, is all being recorded by Jimmy Hyslop from SAC with figures that were most impressive.

I have to say, if I was a suckler cow farmer I would have to be looking at fitting in Stabilisers somewhere!

Finally, to the SBA beef Event, that has already been widely reported, held at the Alexanders' Mains of Mause Farm, near Blairgowrie, where an enormous amount of work had gone into making it an occasion to be remembered for many different reasons.

It was at a point of time when almost every animal going to slaughter is not leaving a margin over cost production. Ian Galloway, Scot Beef chairman, did a good job in his opening address as to why and what was causing the difficulty in the beef sector, which was much more than his colleague SAMW president, Alan McNaughton did at the seminar.

Judging by his remarks, Alan does not seem to know what the word collaboration or communication means. Fortunately, as Patsy Hunter reported last week, we had two very capable farmers who can communicate effectively in Robert Neill and Pat Lambert who were able to put into perspective how the beef industry needs to move forward and to where!

Let me remind Alan that the industry is not looking for beef values to be back at £4.20 levels, but we certainly cannot sustain our businesses when they are back to 2011 levels, which is where we are just now!