|
Farming
Jul 24, 2018 10:02:18 GMT
via mobile
Post by mickthecactus on Jul 24, 2018 10:02:18 GMT
I was quite surprised to find we don’t have a farming thread bearing in mind we have all the world’s intelligentsia on here and it’s huge importance to us all so I thought I would start one.
Please contribute as usual!
|
|
|
Post by questa on Jul 24, 2018 12:14:33 GMT
MOOO.... BA-A-A.
Seriously, it's a bugger of a job in Oz and getting worse. Much of the country is in the worst drought in 100 years, Prices for produce are over the moon but the farmer doesn't get much, the big supermarkets have beaten the farmers down to borderline poverty with their contracts.
The lovely fruits are falling and rotting because there are no pickers. This was once the backpackers' kingdom...travel the country,meet friends and decent wages and conditions.Now floods of illegal workers will do it more cheaply and can't complain.
The problems with cattle and sheep live exports I've mentioned elsewhere, but the markets for our meat and seafoods are being threatened by competition from unlicenced suppliers.
Then the families of farmers...banks are seizing farms that have 5 generations in the family. Children doing their final 2 years of school used to go to boarding school...not now. The suicide numbers are the highest amongst farmers than any other group.Many men have taken on other jobs, trucking, earth moving etc and wives are going back to paid jobs like teaching or nursing just to pay bills. This is as well as running the farm. Prices on fuel and other necessities are much higher than city prices.
All this is before we look at natural crises like Bush fires, floods and cyclones where crops and homes are wiped out and the biggest headache because it won't go away... Global Warming
|
|
|
Farming
Jul 24, 2018 13:03:51 GMT
via mobile
Post by mickthecactus on Jul 24, 2018 13:03:51 GMT
It’s so short sighted. No farming = no food.
Then what?
|
|
|
Farming
Jul 24, 2018 13:08:07 GMT
via mobile
Post by mickthecactus on Jul 24, 2018 13:08:07 GMT
Because of the heatwave here there is little grass for livestock so they are being given winter feed already.
Arable crops simply aren’t growing at all. Wheat has already been harvested a month early in places.
It will cost.
|
|
|
Post by kerouac2 on Jul 24, 2018 13:36:38 GMT
Well, the UK has been receiving £3 billion a year in EU farming subsidies. On January 4th, 2018, the government said that it would continue to give the same amount to farmers for 5 years after Brexit... and then it would figure something out. Good luck.
Actually, even though my family has always been of the lower middle class sort, there were never any farmers in the family at least as far back as the great grandparents. Apparently we were all swept up in the industrial revolution and everybody was in railroads or textiles. My mother was the first person to go up one notch by becoming a teacher. And then my brother and I went on to professions where you never get your hands dirty.
So that puts me in the category of people who don't understand why the farmers are always complaining about something -- the weather, the harvest or the horribly low prices they are getting for their goods. On top of that, when there is a bad year, it is always compared to the previous year where you discover that their revenues had doubled with a bumper crop. But in those years you never hear them saying that they are happy to be making a lot of money.
Okay, I don't want to be cynical. I know that all of the little farmers in every country are being crushed and are basically starving. We want to pay as little as possible for our food, and the giant agricultural conglomerates are merciless. On top of that, it has become pretty cheap to import food from other countries when the price is better. (Oops, that's going to be another problem with Brexit.) I'm sorry to say so, but it is looking to me as though small farming will soon disappear, except as a tourist attraction or a niche market. Then again, did we mourn the disappearance of blacksmiths or potters when everything we wanted to buy became available in shops for a pittance?
We are probably one of the last generations in the developed world to know anything about farm life. In my grandparents' village, we were surrounded by farms and knew lots of farmers. It was fascinating and I loved hiking through all of the fields with my grandfather to tell me what everything was. In a few years, we probably won't even have access to the huge agro industry fields because there will be electric fences around them.
|
|
|
Farming
Jul 24, 2018 13:43:23 GMT
via mobile
Post by mickthecactus on Jul 24, 2018 13:43:23 GMT
Having said that Farmers Weekly says wheat yields are average but quality good due to extra sunshine.
|
|
|
Post by questa on Jul 24, 2018 14:07:08 GMT
No rain = no crop.One week you see the green carpet on your land, in a month it is tall enough to hide your dog, then in a week it is flat and burned to a crisp with the hot winds blowing your topsoil to New Zealand (fact)
|
|
|
Post by mossie on Jul 24, 2018 14:47:42 GMT
"You never see a farmer on a bike". Is an old saying referring to the fact that they are always pleading poverty, but appear to have substantial, but invisible, means. Perhaps unfair now as Questa points out, big business is rolling them over. From my limited experience of several months working on a big mixed farm when I were a lad, all I can say is. It is a lot of hard work, for small monetary reward for the worker, but the boss does OK.
|
|
|
Post by kerouac2 on Jul 24, 2018 17:43:11 GMT
|
|
|
Post by cheerypeabrain on Jul 24, 2018 18:28:55 GMT
My brother in law is a farmer. His fields are scattered around the outskirts of the village where he lives...the tractor, combine harvester and dilapidated barns are around his very modest bungalow. My sister thought that she was marrying a 'rich farmer' but the reality is very different. David worked the land well into his seventies. Now he rents out the land (owned jointly with his brother and sisters) to Co-Op farms who pay him a small percentage of their profits. His income has always been small..the running costs of the farm consuming any profits. David's family have always farmed the area and in the early 20th century the farm was prosperous...there was a huge beautiful farmhouse surrounded by acres of land...his family even donated land for the village to use as a sports field, with a cricket pavilion, football and cricket pitches and a play area for the village children...
Over the years the land was divided up and some sold off...now David is the only descendant still farming...even tho at 84 all he still does is lay hedges and clear the drainage between fields.
There is a point to all this droning on...I suppose that what I'm saying is that very few small farmers make a good living...most are massively in debt. They have often inherited their farms and feel an incredibly strong tie to their land..as well as a responsibility to their local community. They help each other to harvest, and rally to help others in a crisis...farmers are called upon to provide work for locals, to pull cars out of ditches with their tractors, to keep hedgerows healthy for local wildlife...to clear a snow blocked roads...they work from dawn to dusk, often longer...with little free time and are imo bloody brilliant.
Usually at this time of year my BiL is worried about moisture...as he couldn't harvest until his grain has a certain % moisture....but this year not only have farmers the worry of poor growth but also drying out of immature grain. The livestock farmers can't put their animals out to graze as there's no grass...so are using up their winter feed.
With Brexit on the horizon and the prospect of food shortages I reckon we should be doing everything we can to help and encourage British farmers...Sorry to harp on...
|
|
|
Post by kerouac2 on Jul 24, 2018 18:39:50 GMT
For those of you who don't follow the "last movie" thread, I recently talked about the beauty and desperation of farms in Yorkshire, based on two movies that I saw this year.
|
|
|
Post by kerouac2 on Jul 24, 2018 18:50:22 GMT
Actually, those movies pretty much sum up my knowledge of 21st century English farming. I have obviously seen plenty of other British rural movies, but I doubt that what I saw in them is still valid.
|
|
|
Post by questa on Jul 24, 2018 23:25:46 GMT
Mossie...most of the farmers here have clapped out 4 wheel drives which keep going through the ingenuity of the farmer, duct tape and a length of 12 gauge fencing wire. If there are any posher vehicles, they belong to the bank.
cheery...This is a classic example of the farming family. The motto back in the last century was "get big or get out" so hundreds of family farms were sold into co-ops which were then taken over by international corporations who wouldn't know a caterpillar from a caterpillar tractor.
now our "mega farms" are being bought up by Chinese companies who are buying as much arable land as they can. They have taken over all the milk production in Tasmania and a lot of residential land for housing. "What could possibly go wrong?" say the politicians.
One bright spot is the cattle stations in Northern Australia. For nearly 2 centuries these massive holdings have been owned by British interests. Some of these places are bigger than European countries, they are not fenced and the mustering is done by helicopters. Now some land is being returned to the indigenous communities and sections of the land have been allowed to revert to native bushland. Feral animals are being culled (we even sell camels to the Middle East)and the land cared for.
|
|
|
Farming
Jul 25, 2018 5:34:42 GMT
via mobile
Post by mickthecactus on Jul 25, 2018 5:34:42 GMT
Great stuff about Oz again questa.
Thanks.
|
|
|
Post by questa on Jul 25, 2018 7:35:43 GMT
Well, you did elevate me to the "intelligentsia", I gotta keep my street-cred up.
|
|
|
Farming
Jul 25, 2018 8:40:13 GMT
via mobile
Post by mickthecactus on Jul 25, 2018 8:40:13 GMT
Well, you did elevate me to the "intelligentsia", I gotta keep my street-cred up. No elevation at all! You were already there!
|
|
|
Post by questa on Jul 25, 2018 9:05:04 GMT
TV news tonight...Hay now $100 a bale...if you can find some. Farmers feeding sheep on onions not suitable for humans. Sheep a bit iffy at first but now they have the taste for them. (*thinks...wonder if we can wean the lambs onto mint sauce and cut out the middle man *)
|
|
|
Farming
Jul 25, 2018 9:43:56 GMT
via mobile
Post by mickthecactus on Jul 25, 2018 9:43:56 GMT
TV news tonight...Hay now $100 a bale...if you can find some. Farmers feeding sheep on onions not suitable for humans. Sheep a bit iffy at first but now they have the taste for them. (*thinks...wonder if we can wean the lambs onto mint sauce and cut out the middle man *) You wouldn’t want to kiss any of them....
|
|
|
Farming
Jul 25, 2018 9:56:43 GMT
via mobile
Post by mickthecactus on Jul 25, 2018 9:56:43 GMT
Before we got involved with the EU we could get Aussie beef in the shops and very good it was too.
|
|
|
Post by mickthecactus on Jul 25, 2018 11:01:48 GMT
I am rather in the category of K2 above insofar as all my family were fishermen until my father declined having spent 3 days in the bottom of a boat being sick. He promptly passed all his exams and went into insurance. I set up this thread because I saw an excellent programme about farmers in the South of France taking up agroforestry (no doubt they get an excellent subsidy from the government) which I found rather appealing. Here is an article which gives more detail - sustainablefoodtrust.org/articles/agroforestry/
|
|
|
Post by questa on Jul 25, 2018 12:03:19 GMT
You wouldn’t want to kiss any of them... That's New Zealanders you are thinking of, Mick (perennial local joke) NZ has a population of 27 million, 3 million of whom think they are not sheep. (sorry, Bro)
|
|
|
Post by kerouac2 on Jul 25, 2018 14:34:08 GMT
Before we got involved with the EU we could get Aussie beef in the shops and very good it was too. Oh, I'm sure it will be back after Brexit, but do people really want it now? Or the American chlorine chicken? (For people wondering about this chlorine business for chicken and other foods, it is because the United States thinks it is fine to have filthy food processing as long as they douse it in bleach afterwards. That's why there is 20 times more salmonella in the United States than in Europe.)
Australia demands British shops sell its 'hormone-treated beef'
|
|
|
Farming
Jul 25, 2018 15:57:07 GMT
via mobile
Post by mickthecactus on Jul 25, 2018 15:57:07 GMT
They hadn’t invented hormone treated beef then.
|
|
|
Post by mossie on Jul 25, 2018 16:09:37 GMT
Here is one for Questa
|
|
|
Post by questa on Jul 26, 2018 0:26:01 GMT
Yes, Mossie...rather attractive young ewe, obviously speaks English...you could do worse!
|
|
|
Post by bixaorellana on Jul 26, 2018 21:59:44 GMT
|
|
|
Post by bixaorellana on Jul 27, 2018 9:26:40 GMT
... very few small farmers make a good living...most are massively in debt. They have often inherited their farms and feel an incredibly strong tie to their land..as well as a responsibility to their local community. They help each other to harvest, and rally to help others in a crisis... When we talk about farming, we have to talk about both kinds -- agro-business and what we think of as "the family farm". Having lived in a rural area surrounded by the kinds of farms and farmers that Cheery describes, I understand why people would choose such frustrating, often brutal work and why they're sad when it becomes impossible to continue in that tradition. The fact of the matter is that most of us aren't eating food from those farms on a regular basis, no matter how much we'd like to. What mostly gets to our tables are meats and vegetables from all over the world, regardless of season. We generally don't know under what conditions it was produced. Even when organic or semi-organic locally grown food is available, can people raising families or on limited incomes afford it for their daily diet? As far as I know, small farmers get into trouble by going into debt to acquire equipment that might allow them to keep going in the face of competition from giant, corporation-run farms. They keep on with dead-end or destructive practices in a scramble to keep producing crops to keep from going under. Kerouac addresses much of this in his post at #4, and I'm not saying anything we don't all know. I think it's a mistake to automatically see farm subsidies as people getting something for nothing, although undoubtedly there is a great deal of abuse in that system. It does seem that more and more think tanks and global government initiatives are exploring ways to subsidize farmers as they move to more sustainable, less destructive ways of farming. Will this carry over into reining in the strip-mining methods of agri-business though? Just today I read abut carbon-sequestration farming, which seems to be applying old common-sense methods and also seems like the only right way to farm: www.greenamerica.org/food-climate/what-carbon-farming
|
|
|
Farming
Jul 27, 2018 10:22:11 GMT
via mobile
Post by mickthecactus on Jul 27, 2018 10:22:11 GMT
Indeed , excellent article and common sense as you say. Whether it gets taken up is another matter. Actually it ties in nicely with my agroforest article.
|
|
|
Farming
Sept 16, 2018 18:10:48 GMT
via mobile
Post by mickthecactus on Sept 16, 2018 18:10:48 GMT
UK farm debt is estimated at £16bn.
|
|
|
Post by questa on Sept 17, 2018 6:21:32 GMT
Utter Bastardy It is 2 weeks until the peak of the strawberry harvest. Thousands of punnets are already packed and making it to the big supermarkets and the local smaller fruit-and-veg shops. Some twisted bastard had inserted sharp needles or pins into the fruit in the punnet or processing. The tampered fruit was first found in Queensland shops and has spread to NSW and Victoria. Adelaide has had a couple of incidents. Naturally all strawberries have to be taken from the shelves and the farmers have to bear the brunt of the lost crop.
On TV a lone housewife pleaded with the people..."Please keep buying and enjoying the strawberries...just cut them in half and check for needles before eating them. Don't take it out on the growers"
Would YOU buy (cheap) top quality strawberries and check them yourself? I am planning a jam making day.
|
|