Keeping positive!

WHEN I agreed to write this article a few months ago I thought I would have plenty time and lots to talk about; it seems both were in shorter supply than I initially thought!

I’ve been brought up on our family dairy farm in Aberdeenshire, where we are milking a herd of 200 pedigree Holsteins. We milk three times per day and yield is currently 10,500 litres.

My intention is to continue to grow our herd to 300 cows over the next five years. This will be done through keeping our own replacements and the use of sexed semen. This is very much where my interest is focused.

Dairying in the North-east was dealt a huge blow earlier in the year with the announcement that the only milk buyer, Muller, was closing its processing facility in Aberdeen.

Muller is continuing to purchase our milk but has imposed a 1.75 pence per litre charge to cover the cost of transporting the milk to Bellshill near Glasgow.

I think the North-east dairy industry has a huge amount still to offer. The North-east is in a great location to benefit from distillery by products, such as draff and pot-ale, and other inputs such as straw and cereals are easily located.

Our climate avoids the extremes of many other areas and all this makes a super location to farm. A recent survey revealed that North-east dairy farmers have both larger herds and higher yields than the national average. They also have flatter calving patterns which is beneficial to optimising a processing facility.

There has been a huge amount of investment in buildings and milking facilities over the last five years. At home, we installed a new rapid exit milking parlour and complete dairy building.

In addition, nearly all of the farms in the North-east have some young blood coming through. I think that this all really sings a positive message. Work is ongoing behind the scenes to look at a longer term market for our milk and I am confident that this will prove fruitful.

I have been lucky enough to work on lots of different farms and systems. Sheep farming in Ross-shire, arable farming in Nottinghamshire, dairy farming both on an intensive robotic unit in this country and on an extensive grazing system in New Zealand.

On each unit I learnt different skills and ideas which has given me a great base of knowledge and experience. I always jump at the chance to get out onto another farm both here and abroad to try and pick new ideas.

A lot of industry experts and farmers speak a lot about New Zealand and its farming practices, and granted there is a lot that can be learnt from them, but often their missions to cut costs from their systems come with huge welfare issues.

I saw some terrible practices which were widely used out there which could, and in some cases have, proved extremely detrimental to their dairy industry when the general public were made aware of them.

It just takes a video camera at the wrong time and a lot of damage can be done. Agriculture needs to remember that a positive public perception of what we do is crucial to our future.

We should be doing more to tell people what a great job we are making, and educating the public about agriculture. Television series such has ‘Farming Life’ and ‘The Mart’ have done a great job of helping to do this.

Agriculture as a whole has a bright future, but is being held back by many aspects of the current subsidy system. How can it be a better option for someone to have their entire farm fallow than to use the land or even rent it to someone else to use?

Maybe a subsidy to encourage them to rent the farm to a new entrant would be a better use of the money? I have a number of friends desperate to farm in their own right but can’t get a start; maybe a scheme like that would go some way to helping them.

There’s no doubt that the decision to leave the EU came as a surprise to most and that it has caused a great deal of uncertainty in the short to medium term.

I personally voted to remain, but I am positive that we can still prosper outwith the EU. Hopefully, a good trade deal can be negotiated, and also a good system is found to ensure that EU workers can still come and work here easily.

We are going through a period of change. I think that generally speaking there will be a continuation towards fewer but larger units in all farming sectors as our margins continue to be squeezed.

A greater need than ever is required for collaboration and knowledge sharing to ensure that farmers can form a stronger position to negotiate.