News that will impact on 2006 farming plans (From Gazette & Herald)

News that will impact on 2006 farming plans

DESPITE Deaf Ear's protestations, even the murkiest crystal ball would have lit up the shortfall in progress towards finalising our SP applications.

On Monday, Lord Bach admitted that he was "only able act on the basis of the provisional data currently available" and he made two announcements which will affect your farming plans for next year:

Set Aside - for the 2006 scheme year, farmers will be required to set aside the same amount of land that they were obliged to do in 2005.

Once the SP5 applications have been fully processed, then you will be allocated a fixed number of entitlements which will take effect from 2007, but for the meantime, Set Aside business is as normal.

10-month rule - the window within which farmers may set the start date for their 10-month occupation will remain between October 1, 2005 and the April 30, 2006.

However, farmers can now designate two different start dates for separate parcels of land on their holding rather than just the one date as required this year.

This will be helpful especially to those who lease land at different times, although personally I have never understood why we need to specify a start date at all.

My thoughts would be that if we were to be challenged on the 10-month occupation question then it would be up to each individual farmer to prove that he has satisfied the conditions.

Why on earth we have to pretend that every period must commence on a single or even a double date appears completely unnecessary.

But who am I to argue with Lord Bach who finishes with what I assume to be a joke! "One of the benefits of the SPS is that it will reduce the number and complexity of rules traditionally associated with CAP schemes!" - ha ha!

Brazil rejects Irish inspectors

The South American beef industry is being frightened by comments made in this column suggesting that their production standards are not as high as our own and that we who are feeding cattle in the UK are clearly disadvantaged.

Last week Brazil, at a few days notice, cancelled an inspection tour by a 20-strong delegation organised by the agricultural department in Northern Ireland.

Northern Irish farmers have been very critical of the quality of Brazilian beef and more especially the labour practices in its factories.

By cancelling the visits, concern has intensified that Brazil is not prepared to expose its industry standards to outside scrutiny.

This unacceptable veil of secrecy is drawn at a time when statistics reveal South American beef exports have doubled over the past year.

We must press for proper labelling as to the country of origin and then all consumers can make their own choice.

Transfer entitlement rules

There can only be two explanations for farmers being drip fed miniscule doses of information on the Single Payment over the past 18 months - either we are incapable of absorbing the complexity of the scheme in one document or Defra are making it up as they go along. You decide!

After increasing loud complaints from my profession, there finally appeared on the Defra website this Monday some answers about the transfer of entitlements which are, by necessity, having to be dealt with whenever land is transferred by sale or lease.

Before any transfer can take place, the owner of the entitlements, be he buyer or lessor, must give the RPA at least six weeks notice in writing. The date for transfer can only take place thereafter.

A farmer wanting to claim entitlements in any year must be in possession of those entitlements on May 15 which is the date of application.

By reference to the calendar you will see, therefore, that the last date for getting transfers in time for the 2006 application would be April 2 being six weeks prior to May 15.

To transfer entitlements you need to complete form RLE 1 which will be pre-printed with the details of the entitlements you hold.

By definition, therefore, the forms cannot be printed until everyone's entitlement establishments have been confirmed sometime in the New Year. Therefore, no transfers can actually take place until that happens.

You don't have to hold the entitlements for the whole 10-month period of occupation, but you must hold the entitlement on the application date of May 15, if you want to activate its payment for that year.

This is a blessed relief as it means that, in the real world, we are able to take the risk of selling and leasing land in anticipation of transferring entitlements in the future.

All those forced to do so should attend church regularly until the documentation comes through.

Set Aside entitlements can be transferred in exactly the same way as other entitlements although the RPA are asking for clarification as to whether the land transferred with Set Aside entitlements has itself to be in set aside at the time of transfer.

There will be no siphon applied to transfers for at least the first year of the scheme and whatever you wish to sell or lease will be done so in its totality.

Keep watching this space as we desperately need more information.

Private data base for US traceability

Presumably the US department of agriculture took a long look at the role model of traceability in the British Cattle Movement Service (BCMS) and in the immortal words of Oliver Hardy to Stan Laurel, "This is another fine mess you've got us into!"

The Americans are hoping to provide a national animal identification system that remains flexible, while avoiding the undue burden on producers that has been crushing UK farmers.

Rather than waste public funds on creating a white elephant as in Europe, they are going to have their traceability system operated by private enterprise fully accessible to the State Health Authorities. If only we could turn the clock back and do likewise.

A note from our Whenby correspondent

The Whenby correspondent picked up on a piece in last week's column about the American prediction that we are going to need vast more quantities of food and that we would be better advised to support high production methods rather than listen to the Green Party.

He points out that in the 1960s dozens of scientists including the notorious Dr Hermann Kahn, of the Rand Corporation, predicted that the world would run out of food by the year 2000. I suppose we are living proof of their false forecast.

The man from Whenby goes on to point out that although we can't get high yields of wheat or rape in the UK without artificial assistance, we do have the propensity to grow grass and clover which can out yield heavily fertilised grass.

In America itself, the Rodale Institute in Illinois can get both maize and soya without chemicals to match the yields of good commercial crops and even out-weigh them in dry years.

Whatever your views, we are going to have to rethink the use of nitrogen if it is priced at over £150 per tonne next season. Our reporter then raises a sort of fertiliser not often discussed in the shape or perhaps, not, of human sewage! I had better end this week's column on that note.

Market report

Forward 85 cattle including 44 bulls, 670 sheep including 165 ewes. Light steers to 127p J L Gray, Grindale, ave, 106.6p; heavy steers to 125p J L Gray, Grindale, ave 98.5p; light heifers to 95p Charity Farms, Thornton-le-Dale; heavy heifers to 125p D R Jackson, Carnaby, ave 100.5p; heavy bulls to 107p D Windrass, Gillamoor, ave 94.6p; Black and white bulls to 77p J Simpson, Harewood Dale, ave 73.2p; standard lambs to 95.7p M A Hammond, Ebberston Common, ave 91.6p; medium lambs to 101.9p P Richardson Ness, ave 92.8p; heavy lambs to 94.7p W Smith, Salton, ave 91.4p; ewes to £40 G L Riby, Fraisthorpe, ave £27.60.

Updated: 15:15 Wednesday, October 05, 2005