Farmers face a tough year, but we’re tough too
Despite new threats like rewilding and vegans, rural life’s soothing constancy will see us through
As we creep, with a shiver of dread, towards the new year, many of us are now desperately clinging on to the fast-fading warm fuzz of Christmas. You know the holidays are coming to a tragic conclusion when you find yourself looking back longingly at a favourite moment of the festive break. It might have been an old tree decoration that reminded you of someone no longer here, or curling up on the sofa to watch a Christmas film.
As the wife of a dairy farmer in the Staffordshire Moorlands, the most memorable moment for me was when the Young Farmers’ carol singers called on us. We invited some neighbours round to listen and share the mulled wine and mince pies. But I couldn’t help looking at the faces of the enthusiastic young people and wondering whether they would spend their working lives in our industry, or, because of the problems facing farmers, move away from the land.
Our thriving local livestock market had a carol service a couple of weeks ago, too; there was someone playing an organ in the dairy selling ring, the rustle of carol sheets, the crinkle of work overalls, a rich aroma of farm animals mingling with rum in coffee, raw-red hands, raised voices, and singing replacing the usual rapid patter of salespeak from the auctioneer. The determination to enjoy ourselves this year was almost feverish; it was as if we were savouring the magic and merriment all the more because we are keenly conscious that 2019 spells deep uncertainties for the countryside and rural way of life.
There is nothing new about farming woes and worries. It does feel different though, this winter. Many of us are concerned about how Brexit will affect government priorities and support for the agricultural sector. We are particularly nervous about the potential relaxation of food import regulations as Britain pursues new trade deals, and how tariff changes could impact livestock farming.
These urgent worries are accompanied by a more existential question about the role of farmers in modern society. In recent months, in particular, we have been subjected to a pincer attack from people who basically want to get rid of us. I’m referring specifically to the most extreme elements of the rewilding and the vegan movements. Like all fundamentalists, they are completely intolerant towards ways of life that contradict their straitjacketed and systemised way of thinking. I have heard vegans refer to livestock farmers as “cruel” and “greedy”, even though they treat their animals with dignity and, often, affection. Besides, arable crops raise moral issues of their own. Anti-meat protesters stuff their kitchen cupboards with avocados that fuel deforestation in Mexico. They can’t get enough of quinoa, a grain crop that, due to high demand, is now unaffordable to many of the farmers growing it in South America.
And, here on British soil, the type of farming that would result from a much greater shift to veganism would be more intensive, industrial and reliant on greater use of artificial fertilisation and weed and pest control.
Which hits on the great unsolvable paradox of agriculture, which vegans are yet to grasp: if you are really out to get rid of farming, your food will be produced on a bigger scale in a more industrialised way. We have to eat and food has to come from somewhere.
It’s not just vegans causing problems for farmers. Rewilding enthusiasts are on a mission to transform swathes of the countryside back to “its natural state” by expanding woodlands and reintroducing native species. Unfortunately, some misguidedly see farmers as the enemy. In my area, peppered with small and low-intensity farms, serious discussions take place about the sight of the first swallow, where the barn owls have nested and how to manage areas of the land to encourage lapwings and other birds. Although rewilders have some exciting ideas, carried to its extreme, their ideology would change this country and our countryside radically – and, again, what would we eat?
The latter question is an obvious and basic one, but it is being overlooked. Possibly as a result of convenience food and the detached nature of shopping in supermarkets – even more so, online – we have less understanding and connection with food production and with those who grow and rear what we eat than ever before.
In spite of all the uncertainties we face as we enter the new year, our lives as farmers still feel defined by a certain timelessness. Our chores are always there, and no matter what catastrophe strikes, the presence of livestock means that you have to get out there and bed down and feed them to schedule without fail. On a dairy farm, the cows have to milked twice a day no matter what else is going on. As farmers we draw strength from these constants.
There is a calming, affirming feeling in carrying out important, physically demanding tasks when the world around you seems so precarious. Come what may in 2019, we will get our heads down and battle through.
FOLLOW Noreen Wainwright on Twitter @farmerwainwrigh; READ MORE at telegraph.co.uk/opinion