UK Farming union leaders call for long term confidence from supply chain

UK Farming Union leaders have today called for long term sustainable supply relationships to boost the current fragile confidence of farmers following a difficult summer.

During a meeting of the four UK Farming Union leaders, held in Cardiff yesterday, union leaders from all countries reported farmers across all sectors have had their confidence knocked in recent weeks. Various reasons were cited including bad weather which affected arable harvesting and caused a reduction in milk production, plus high input costs and price volatility in the red meat sector.

NFU Deputy President Meurig Raymond said: "It is the same wherever you are farming in the UK at present. Farmers have seen a much-needed general rise in prices during the past 12 months, across all commodities, which boosted the confidence of those that were considering walking away from the industry. However farmers"e; confidence has been knocked for six this summer due to the bad weather and rising costs.

"As representatives of farmers across the UK we are calling on the supply chain to deliver long term confidence in the way of sustainable supply relationships before we see farmers turning their backs on production, which would naturally have a knock on effect on production levels and see less home-produced food on supermarket shelves."

The UK Farming Union leaders also agreed to continue their fight on behalf of all farmers across the country to reduce the amount of bureaucratic burden emerging from Brussels which again was undermining confidence in all farming sectors.

Two regulations that will have particular impact on farmers in the near future are the Electronic Identification and individual recording of sheep and the Pesticides Directive.

Mr Raymond said: "Basically these are regulations for regulation sake and are not based on sound science. We will all continue, through our contact with MEPs and the Commission, to do everything within our powers to deliver a common sense alternative to these regulations."