3:47pm Thursday 15th May 2008
By Gazette Reporter
YORK farmer Rosey Dunn has become the first woman to serve on the NFU's Governance Board - a small group of national and regional officeholders responsible for day-to-day decisions relating to how the union is run.
For Rosey this is the culmination of many years representing local farmers - first as a member of local livestock and sugar beet committees and following regionalisation as county chairman for York East in 2003-4 before being elected council delegate in 2006 and chairman of the North East regional board last year.
She farms in partnership with her husband Alisdair and son James and it's thanks to their support that she has been able to even consider making the now frequent trips to NFU headquarters at Stoneleigh.
The family's tenanted farm is a modest 112 acres plus 50 acres of grazing, but it supports a solid mixed enterprise of sheep, beef finishing, sucklers and arable. The farm was hard hit with the demise of the York sugar factory, but Rosey said that improved cereal prices have in part made up the income shortfall.
Rosey got the farming bug' as a youngster, helping every weekend and holiday on her great uncle's farm - located in the East Yorkshire village of West Knapton, not a million miles from Stockton-on-the-Forest where Rosey farms today.
Although that farm was sold before Rosey left school, slowly but surely she gravitated towards farming when her first job as a tractor driver found her working for then farm manager, Alisdair.
Looking back Rosie says the things that attracted her to farming in the first place still motivate her today. Livestock is hugely important to her, so she's very committed to doing everything possible to help ensure livestock farming has a secure future ahead of it.
Although down to earth, Rosey has strong views about the challenges ahead, both for the NFU as a membership organisation and for the industry as a whole.
Maintaining the NFU's influence with government has to be top priority she says. "To some extent the fortunes of the NFU are linked to the importance that the public gives to farming," she said. "With ever more emphasis on food security, we must capitalise on the opportunity to impress on the Government and the nation the importance of productive farming.
"In many sectors, we are literally fighting for our lives and our battle to achieve better returns from the marketplace depends to a significant degree on the extent to which the industry and the food we produce is valued.
"There are many, very serious obstacles in our way, not least the relationship with major retailers, the onslaught of environmental regulation and a government with a totally unrealistic take on what is meant by responsibility and cost sharing. The international debate on the value or otherwise of biofuels also threatens to weaken the market opportunities this new industry presents.
"Set against this, though, are world market forces that seem to be moving very much in our favour, with demand for food rising on the back of higher and wealthier populations worldwide.
"Joining the governance board is not something I set out to achieve, but I'm delighted to have been elected, and hope to help the NFU tackle the enormous workload that stretches before it. "
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