Blog

We need to talk about the uplands. For years it has felt like farmers in the uplands have been fighting battles on all fronts.

Calving is well underway with our senior cow Julia kicking things off in mid-February with a lovely heifer calf.

Apart from our grass fields being animated by lambs and calves and the odd daffodil begrudgingly enduring the frosts, snow and rain, there are no obvious signs that spring is around the corner here just yet.

James Nixey, 26, is from Chinnor, Oxfordshire and works as a self-employed electrician while supporting and getting stuck in on the family’s mixed farm.

Headlines around food inflation have sparked a wider debate about the cost of food, namely, dare I say it, how cheap it is.  

Last year saw the first reduction in the amount of land rented to farmers since Farm Business Tenancies were introduced in 1995, according to Defra’s own figures.

A couple of days at the NFU Conference made a change from my usual working week, it was my first time at the conference.

Whatever you think about HS2 — the cost of it; if the country even really needs it — the way operators have handled it so far has fallen woefully short of what should be expected. 

Farming is an industry that requires long-term planning, but the slow development of new post-Brexit farm policy for England is making that vital planning frustratingly difficult for farmers.