GOING BACK TO THE LAND
FOR A while Charlie Pye-Smith fancied himself as a farmer. He’d grown up on the outskirts of Huddersfield where there was a pig farm at the end of the back garden and during summer holidays in North Yorkshire he would spent most of the time collecting eggs, stacking straw and rounding up sheep.
Actually owning his own smallholding seemed like the natural next step and before heading to Newcastle University to study agriculture he spent a year on a farm near Masham.
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, though not necessarily in that order,” he says. “I still look back on that summer’s harvest with warm nostalgia, but the winter was pretty miserable. I was charged with bringing the cows in for milking. I think they sensed my lack of experience and let me know who was in charge with their hooves. By the end of the year I knew I would make pretty incompetent farmer.”
That was in 1970 and while Charlie changed degree courses and never did realise his childhood dream, farming has remained a continuous thread throughout his life. A writer and broadcaster, he reports regularly on global farming and environmental issues, but more often than not his focus has tended to be on Africa and the developing world.
However, a couple of years ago Charlie’s thoughts turned back to his home country and to Yorkshire as he became increasingly frustrated by how little most people know about what he describes as Britain’s “oldest and most important industry”.
“You can get by without a car or electric lighting, but however rich or poor you are, you have to eat food and yet I became increasingly aware of just how disconnected most of us have become from the land. We know so little about food production and even less about the people who produce it.”
In an attempt to redress the balance, Charlie decided he would embark on a journey of discovery around Britain testing the temperature of its rural communities. He wanted to know what were the pressing issues, whether farming’s future looked bleak or bright and having kept in touch with various farming friends in Yorkshire he decided his home county should be his first port of call.
“I was advised that the Nidderdale village of Middlesmoor would be a good place to start,” he says.
“Stephen Ramsden inherited the estate in 1989 when he was 28 years old and now farms 1,000 acres himself. He is very hands on which is quite unusual, but what has happened to Middlesmoor has been replicated across the country.”
At the turn of the 20th century 120 lived in Middlesmoor. Now there are just 40 and a third of the properties are now run as holiday homes.
“That’s much better than a lot of other places in the Dales. In Kettlewell half of the dwellings are second homes and it often means locals are priced out of the market. Stephen wants people born and bred in Middlesmoor to be able to stay which is why he is offering new tenancies to the children of existing tenants.
“He is also acutely aware that the way he manages the estate has a profound influence on the social and economic welfare of the upper dale. Back in 1919 there were 17 farms on the estate. Now there are 10. He is determined to keep them all going and knows that he has to be commercially savvy and open to diversification.”
They were words which cropped up time and again on Charlie’s journey around Britain as he met with those on the frontline of agriculture from dairy farmers to major fruit and vegetable growers.
“It’s impossible to deny that there are some corners of real hardship,” he says. “I met one dairy farmer in Yorkshire who had to keep selling off bits of land just to pay the overdraft. Then there were the organic farmers in Devon who had fallen on hard times. They had been forced to sell their truck and pull the back seats out of their car just to take produce to market.
“It can be tough to make a living from the land, but often it’s about cooperation. Take John Stephenson who is secretary of the Swaledale Sheep Breeders’ Association. A few years ago he met the meat manager for Marks & Spencer at the Royal Ulster Show who asked him whether he could get enough farms together to provide a guaranteed supply of Swaledale lambs between mid-February and mid-April. During the first year, John organised the supply of 250 lambs a week. Now it’s up to 500.
“As he said himself, the numbers aren’t earth shattering, but it means that specially branded Swaledale lamb is getting into M&S during springtime and that’s good for the farmers who supply it. It also links Swaledale sheep to a beautiful upland landscapes and help sell the idea ‘eat our lamb and you are helping to protect the Dales’.
“John admitted said that the stubbornness of farmers and their independent spirit doesn’t always work in their favour, but he is proof that if they can find ways to work together they are often better than the sum of their parts.”
Charlie’s rural travelogue began before the EU Referendum but ended it in a post-Brexit world where every homegrown industry is facing uncertain times. The EU currently accounts for 70 per cent of our food exports and if our links to the single market are severed entirely then it will have a major impact on farming.
“In 1995 British farmers provided close to 80 per cent of the food we consumed. Now it’s fallen to around 60 per cent and meanwhile our population continues to rise. Instead of increasing food imports to meet growing demands we should be encouraging and supporting more home production
“The figures tell us that 60 per cent of the farming community voted Leave, but I am not sure how accurate that figure is. Certainly if you ask those who run the fruit farms of Lincolnshire, which are dependent on migrant labour, you will find they were staunch remainers.
“But however people voted earlier in the year we are now heading out of the EU and that will inevitably mean less of a reliance on brown envelope subsidies. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. As more than one farmer said to me, the good ones will not only survive, but they will thrive.” Charlie’s book of his travels
is out next and as the publication nears he says he is optimistic about the next chapter for British farming.
“Maybe it’s misplaced optimism, but while we tend to think of farmers as being conservative types, over the years they have demonstrated a remarkable ability to change and adapt and to embrace innovation.
“They already have to deal with inconsistent weather, fluctuating commodity prices and Brexit is just another hurdle.”
by Charlie Pye-Smith is published by Elliott and Thompson is out on July 27 priced £20.