Sir, – There is much talk in the press regarding mental health in agriculture. Is it any wonder?

We get bombarded constantly with the latest buzzwords, ‘sustainability’, ‘carbon footprint’, ‘min till’, ‘no till’, ‘environmental impact’ ... it goes on and on. We need to do more – more record keeping, more quality assurance, more to demonstrate to an unappreciative public that their food is produced to the very highest standard.

So it is little wonder that farmers struggle to keep their heads up? The rhetoric that is constantly poured out is confusing and contradictory. Soil health benefits from animal manure, yet animals are destroying the planet; don’t plough as it releases carbon, yet minimum cultivation doesn’t work without Roundup – and that's seen as the devil incarnate. We can't do right for doing wrong!

Let's look at the facts. Cheap food has been the cornerstone for the modern capitalist system. From that, everything else flows.

It's simple enough. If you spend 50% or more of your disposable income on food, there's not much left. However, cut that to 10% or less and you have lots more money to enjoy meals out, entertainment, holidays, cars, hot tubs, all the extras that’s underpin economic growth. In short, consumerism!

It's in every government in the world's interest to push down the cost of food, no matter what colour the party in power, and in recent times they have been ably assisted by the companies that have grown from that self-same consumerism into multi-national companies and from their sheer scale dominate and distort the free market all with the blessing of whichever government is in power.

Not content with rock bottom prices for food, quality assurance schemes were brought in. I well remember when it started – we were promised extra for our produce if we joined up and within a year you couldn’t sell into mainstream markets if not assured.

It has steadily grown until we now have a whole industry, which we ourselves pay for, beating us around the head with a stick that grows bigger every year and its purpose is not really anything other than to give them a so-called marketing edge. A marketing tool that we finance that promotes whatever agenda is current at the time.

The present agenda is to use agriculture to greenwash their own appalling pollution record. Coca Cola, PepsiCo and Nestle have the unenviable distinction of being the three most polluting companies on the planet for the third year running, so perhaps farmers who are concerned about environmental impacts should think twice before dealing with these companies. It cannot do our image any good!

Have they now squeezed the golden goose too hard? Has she finally laid her last golden egg? Rocketing costs, shortages of labour, dwindling supplies of essential inputs are just some of the problems conspiring to bring a perfect storm.

Young people who pick the fruit and veg for minimum wage now look over the fence at their urban cousins and a better life beckons them. Better wages, better conditions, what's not to like?

Farmers and farm workers are leaving all the crap behind. They are voting with their feet as they've all had the life and will, squeezed out of them. We are indeed living in interesting times where the risk of famine in a lot of the world is a very compelling prospect and the UK will not be immune from the fallout.

The engine that was British agriculture is now running on fumes and it will be interesting to see what food the rest of the world has left to send us.

So, take heart all of you who feel down trodden. The systems that have entrapped and enslaved you are crumbling before our very eyes.

You may yet find you have value with your knowledge and your skills, and this system that has driven you to despair may soon be gone and you will be rid of these individuals who say, ‘I don’t know how to do your job but my clipboard says you're doing it wrong”! Good riddance!

Name and address supplied.