Farming Today
12/10/24 Farming Today This Week: charges for inspections at abattoirs, beef prices, slurry spreading in Wales, water management
Proposals for abattoirs to take on more of the cost of vets and meat inspectors are 'excessive and dangerous' according to the meat industry. The Association of Independent Meat suppliers or AIMS which represents both big and small slaughterhouses, says the Food Standards Agency's plan to remove or reduce the discount offered to smaller abattoirs risks 'single-handedly destroying the foundations of the British meat industry. The FSA have urged people to take part in their consultation.
Farmers are getting the highest price for their beef animals in England and Wales, for ten years. Part of the reason, according to Meat Promotion Wales, is growing domestic demand. We speak to the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board.
Some Welsh farmers claim they're having to choose between the risk of polluting rivers or breaking the law, ahead of a controversial muck-spreading ban. New rules forbid slurry spreading across Wales from mid October to January, in an effort to protect water quality.
After a record breaking year of rainfall across many parts of the UK water management has become an ever pressing issue for farmers. In Wales, it's a year since the launch of the Welsh Government's Natural Flood Management Accelerator programme. We visit a natural flood management project that's part of the two-year £4.6 million pound programme.
Conservationists in Devon are working with Natural England to see whether there could be some kind of financial support for farmers who make space for beavers on their land as part of natural flood management.
Presenter = Charlotte Smith Producer = Rebecca Rooney
- Broadcast on:
- 12 Oct 2024
- Audio Format:
- other
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New customers on first three-month plan only, taxes and fees extra. Speed slower above 40 gigabytes of detail. BBC sounds, music, radio, podcasts. Hello, and welcome to the Farming Today podcast with me, Charlotte Smith. In today's episode, the Welsh farmers battling rain and regulations. I haven't looked at a river and I haven't rocked the law in my life, and I don't want to start now. The row over increased charges for vets in abattoirs. I would say that at least half the slaughterhouses in the UK would close. It would wipe out the small and medium-sized slaughterhouses. We do recognise that smaller businesses may have more difficulty in meeting some of these costs, and that's exactly why we've launched this consultation. More on that later, along with the beavers, using rubbish. The dams are made from mud and sticks, and then stones, all sorts, really. Things like pills, macans, wine bottles, bricks, so they're really quite strong and capable animals. But let's start with something that's dominated this programme over the last few months, rain. After a record-breaking year of rainfall across many parts of the UK, this week our sister programme, Farming Today, took the opportunity to look at water management. We've heard from farmers with land underwater, or too waterlogged to be able to plant or harvest. Farmers watching crops rot, and their incomes fall. So managing floods, and indeed droughts, is something that's on a lot of mines. Well, it's a year since the launch of the Welsh Government's Natural Flood Management Accelerator programme, a two-year, £4.5 million investment in nature-based solutions to reduce flooding. Sarah Moore's been to see one of the projects covering the Y valley and the veil of usk. Countless streams flow down into the river usk, one of Wales' longest rivers. How often do you see it like this? It'll run like this pretty much all winter now, and you can see it's very clear. At the bottom of the usk valley, the village of Land Gatwick lies just across the river from Crick Owl. Some properties here often get flooded, though not park farm, a 200-acre sheep and cattle farm. The soil type here is quite free draining, but like with the rain we've had the last few days, the streams about the place have really risen. Will Land and his partner are the tenant farmers here. With the agreement of the landlords and through the Y and usk Foundation's soil project, funded by Paris County Council and the Welsh Government, Will is doing three things to try and improve water infiltration and reduce water runoff across this land. We decided to do the aeration and the rotational grazing, and then cover crops. I guess with cows trampling over the land all the time, compaction can be quite a problem. Yes, you think, oh, there's no heavy machinery travelling it, but, yeah, you take a cow or a sheep walking over it day after day. It's amazing what compaction you do get. That is why we've done the aeration. The second thing you mentioned was rotational grazing, right? We've got a 30-acre field out here, and we've lectured fence into six paddocks of about 45 acres. So I've got 20 cattle, and they'll rotate round every week to 10 days, so that allows the grass to grow back, utilise the fertilizer in the ground, get stronger roots, and also, you're not poaching the ground, like you would be if they're running the lot all the time. Each patch of grass would have about a five-week period of resting. Yes, yeah, yeah, which is ideal, it just allows it to grow back. And then the third one was the cover crops. Yes. So this is an area of land that wouldn't normally have a crop on it. You can see over there in the distance it would be left like that all winter, and, yeah, heavy rain on that, you're just washing that top soil away, where your nitrogen is and all your nutrients is. So you're essentially planting a crop for ground cover then, so you don't get the run-off. There's quite a lot of flooding flowing down in the valley. And I think the ground's quite right at the moment. Using hydrological modelling, the Wyandusk Foundation is working with nine landowners on the soil project. Quite close to our farm is a small river called the Oni Vark, and this was quite significant in the flooding that occurred. By the bridge into Crickell in 2020, that made a lot of news headlines. A little further uphill on land which boasts views across the valley to the Black Mountains, George Smith owns a smaller 20-acre plot of the kind of land which is harder to farm, and he has just 10 sheep. Sheep aren't really viable on the amount of land we've got. So in the past few years, we've decided to look at rewilding and see how we can improve things for the community. We've fenced in some areas with the intention of planting some willow beds across the flow lines, and willow in a damp area grows. Quite quickly. And the idea being that the roots would soak up. Yeah, the roots were soaked up. It's very fast growing, and it's quite water-hungry as well. Further down, about 20 years ago, I did plant some more trees, and that's made a massive difference I've noticed when I walk through the woodland, so it's already having an effect there. The section of our land where I'm planting the willow beds, it's redundant land anyway, so all I'm doing is improving it. An additional benefit is that I've got to buy a mass boiler, which I fuel from wood from our existing plantation. But also, I can get quite a lot of wood harvested from the willow plantation in a few years' time as well. So hopefully, it'll be a benefit to everyone. George Smith there in the veil of ask. Well, conservationists have long argued that the reintroduction of beavers can help reduce the risk of flooding. The dams they build slow the flow of water in rivers, holding it back from built-up areas further downstream. Well, beavers have been living wild on the river Otter in East Devon for at least 16 years, but last year, there was significant flooding in the area. Following a five-year study to monitor their impact, the local wildlife trust is now working with Natural England to see whether there could be some kind of financial support for farmers who make space for beavers on their land. Well, Fiona Clampen's been to find out how much difference the beavers are really making to flood risk in the river's catchment. Tipton St John near Otter East St Mary was one of the area's worst hit. Parents were told not to collect their children from the primary school this afternoon. Roads were absolutely impassable. That was how the BBC reported flooding of the river Otter in May last year, in an area of East Devon where beavers are known to live. Just walking out the farm track here. On our right-hand side is sheet-grazed grass pasture, and on our left is this kind of lovely riparian wet woodland with a beaver wetland in it. And on the other side is a large maize field. Matt Holden from Devon Wildlife Trust is monitoring the beavers' impact closely on a tributary of the same river at East Budley. It's hoped the dramatic scenes of 2023 experienced a few miles upstream from here are a thing of the past, thanks to the reintroduction of beavers. This river corridor was always quite wet and boggy, and now we see it's a lot wetter and a lot bogier, and there's these lovely open water ponds created by their large dams across the small stream. What they're really looking for is water that's about 70 centimeters to a meter deep. They can swim around that safely. Importantly, they can have an underwater burrow in which they can access their lodge, and that's where they'll spend their day. They're a nocturnal, corpuscular species. So that gives them a lot of evasion from predators, and in the day it means they can swim about to access forage. I'm Alan Putock. I'm a lecturer in nature-based solutions at the University of Exeter. And for the last 10 years or so, my research has particularly been focusing on the risks that we face with flooding and drought and hydrologic wet streams. For me, the question here was, can this be the wetland help slow the flow of water, increase water storage within the landscape? And during those damaging flood events, can it protect that downstream village? And just using this site as an example, it really has here. The wetland we're in now, it can store up to six and a half million liters of water. Wow. And thanks to the environment agency, we've got excellent monitoring just downstream of the site. So this allowed us to show, for instance, that during the storm events, when you get that rapidly, brush your water, quite often leaving the dam, causing that downstream damage, we were seeing flood peaks reduced by around 30%. And I think you can't attribute it solely to beavers, but since beavers have been here, I don't think we've suffered flooding in the downstream village. You get the best view of the dam from here, really. So what do they make the dams from? The dams are made from mud and sticks and then stones, all sorts, really. You can see a little bit of maize that's been popped on top from where they've been feeding. But you also get things like hills, macans, wine bottles, bricks. So they're really quite strong and capable animals. That has actually come up kind of half a foot since I saw it a few weeks ago. And that's brilliant in how much water it's holding. But a lot of people that get concerned about, or what if the dam kind of blows out or disintegrates? And what we see is that very rarely happens, and when it does, it's a very slow process. I started this piece with a clip from last year when a village, not far from here, tips in St John, was flooded. So when we see some villages being flooded, where beavers are, but also others like this one, not being flooded or the flood risk being reduced. How successful do you think beavers are in that sense? Tip in St John's on the main river Otter. Now, in the main river of Otter, beavers don't need to build dams. They've got plenty of adequate, deep water. So it's really in these headwater streams where they build their dams, and they have the most influence or impact on flows of water. Beavers can be part of the solution, not the solution. I think that's critical to say. Beavers won't construct wetlands everywhere, but we do have a science in the evidence to say where beavers can provide benefits, and where we might need to work with our known nurse to manage off their impacts. Alan Putzak from the University of Exeter, more on managing water on BBC Sounds, just search for farming today. Now, the rain has led some Welsh farmers to claim that they're having to choose between the risk of polluting rivers or breaking the law ahead of a controversial muck spreading ban. New rules for bid slurry spreading across Wales from mid October to January, in an effort to protect water quality. And a few comaries says there's enormous concern after wet conditions have hampered efforts to empty slurry stores ahead of the deadline. But the organisation representing Welsh rivers trusts say farmers have had years to prepare for the changes. Stefan Messenger is environment correspondent for BBC Wales. The slurry pit, as you can see, is 12 foot deep. The area we've got left, we have about if they're all the cattle we're in. We have capacity for about another month, I would say, left in the slurry pit. Gary Hawells' slurry pit should be far emptier by now, with days to go until a ban on muck spreading comes into force across Wales. But weeks of rain has meant his land is waterlogged. It's been raining, if you can remember, through the autumn, August, as September, the ground conditions are very wet. You can't take many tractors on particular fields. Do I risk polluting the river by dumping slurry on a few fields to get my pit empty? Or do I wait until after the close period? And as it is now, breaking the rules and the law to get rid of my slurry in a sensible way, working with nature and with the weather and getting slurry out when I can. I haven't polluted a river and I haven't rocked the law in my life. And I don't understand now. What does he, Wirankan, his government want me to do? By the 15th of October, most Welsh farmers need to show they have at least five months worth of slurry storage capacity. And they're in a position to no longer need to spread their animals manure for three months. I have these very rigid calendar dates around spreading slurry. It's going to make it very difficult. There's a lot of worry out there from farmers about how they are going to manage this through the winter. I mean, it's just like having the rug pulled out from underneath. I'm Abi Rida, and I'm the NFU Conry Deputy President. These rules have been debated, haven't they, for the best part of the decade? And they were announced in 2021, so farmers have had time to prepare. Neither the grant money has been delivered up until the last couple of months ago, and also with having serious issues with councils trying to get planning commission through. So it hasn't been plain sailing for many, many farms. But at a time of huge public interest in water pollution, river groups take a different view. I'm Gail Deuswalsh, and I'm CEO of Avonith Conry, which is the umbrella body for the river's trusts in Wales. So rivers are unfortunately in chaos at the moment. Only yesterday, Natural Resources Wales published its 2023 stock assessments for the iconic species of salmon and sea trout. And they showed the lowest numbers since records began in the 1970s. Fundamentally, our rivers are in a really poor place. Some of the highest areas of water quality. Impact moment coincide with very high agricultural rural communities. And sorry, it is frequently cited as one of the main causes of pollution. You know, it is really unfortunate and disappointing that at times like this, the farmers unions tend to call for a further delay to regulations. There was a generous transition period given by Welsh government to the agricultural community. We really need to see these regulations stay as they are. One thing I'm here in Cabinet sector is, who should farmers contact to discuss the issues they're having? In the centre this week, the Rural Affairs Secretary Huarankar Davis said he was listening to farmers' concerns and announced there would be some leniency when it comes to policing the regulations this year, where farmers can prove they're taking steps to comply. I do recognise the difficulties farms have faced since the regulations were introduced, include any impact of global events on materials and costs and the need for time to access financial support to achieve compliance. So I have, in consultation with NLW, considered the enforcement approach in these circumstances. It'll be down to natural resources whales to enforce the ban. It said it had carried out 500 farm inspections already and would continue to work constructively with the industry. Stephen Messenger reporting there. Farmers are getting the highest price for their beef animals in England and Wales for 10 years. Part of the reason, according to meat promotion whales, is growing domestic demand. Well, Anna Hill spoke to Hannah Clark, senior red meat analyst at the Agriculture and Water Culture Development Board, which covers both England and Wales. Prime cattle prices through the four weeks to the 28th of September, which is the latest data we have at the moment, have been 6% on average higher versus the same period last year. And average cow valleys have been up by a similar amount as well. So we are at a historic high level. Okay, so why? What's happening? Well, prices have really come to their level currently, despite there being more supply on the market from both increased slaughter levels and imports as well. It would suggest that demand drivers affirm. So just to put it simply, you're basically saying that people are eating more beef. Yeah, we've seen an increase in sales, volume sales of beef through retail. The cost of living pressures that we've seen over the last few years and price inflation and cost inflation have eased a little this year. And that would have taken some pressure off consumer spending. As well now, seasonally, we're heading into winter. We're seeing increased buying interest in the supply chain ahead of that really key period of Christmas. Will these mean prices are up on supermarket shelves? So that's quite a difficult one to tweeze out. Markets are all interlinked. But in terms of direct costs on shelf, we wouldn't have really any evidence on that point. So what does it mean for farmers then? If the prices are up, does it mean they're making good profits? Yeah, I mean, as we all know, the industry has had to tackle significant increases and volatility and input costs for things like fertilizer, feed and fuel over the last few years. We've seen that input cost inflation generally cool into 2024, which will have created a more stable picture in terms of farm inputs. But even when we factor those adjustments in on farm costs and the strong beef price, the latest cost reduction data we have from our farm bench program shows that only the top 25% of beef producers that's across Suckler and finishing enterprises are in a profitable position. So does that mean then that 75% of beef producers at farmers are not actually making a profit? So even with a strong beef price, we know that profitability is still an issue across the vast majority of the sector. Does there need to be a change in the way beef is produced so that farmers are more farmers are making a profit out of it? We've recently released a report on the top 25% of farmers and what they do differently. We always advocate farmers to really understand their cost of production. And we have a lot of tools and resources available on AHP website for farmers to do that. But, you know, of course, a lot of things are outside the farmers' control, things like weather, which have a huge impact and exposure to the global market as we are with things like feed fuel and fertilizer. There's a lot outside the farmers' control. Hannah Clark from the AHDB. Proposals for abattoirs to take on more of the cost of vets and meat inspectors are excessive and dangerous. That's according to the meat industry. The Association of Independent Meat Suppliers Ames, which represents both big and small sauter houses, says the food standards agencies plans to remove or reduce the discount offered to smaller abattoirs risks single-handedly destroying the foundations of the British meat industry. The FSA, which covers England, Northern Ireland and Wales, has issued a call for evidence on the proposed changes, saying that the costs of providing inspectors and official vets, known as OVs, have increased and that needs to be passed on to businesses. An argument which doesn't impress Peter Hewson, veterinary director at Ames. Costs have gone up, discounts have gone down, and we've now got to a stage where our companies at the moment are paying so much more than equivalent companies in Europe, France, Ireland, for instance. A medium-sized slaughterhouse now here would be paying about 3,000 a month. In France or Ireland, the equivalent will be paying about 800 a month. The full cost without the discount would be about 8,000 a month. An FSA are saying they're going to increase their costs, considering next year with the new contract. So we're looking at potentially if the discount went, UK plants paying 10 times what a plant would pay in France or Ireland. That's just not possible then to survive on that sort of payment. This is though the system that ensures the welfare of animals and the safety of food, so it is needed, isn't it? Well, it gives consumers some comfort, I think, to know that plants have official veterinarians in them to look after the welfare of animals. As far as food safety is concerned, the European Food Safety Authority says that meat inspection doesn't identify any of the pathogens associated with meat. So if you had your way then, would you change the system and get rid of parts of it? Oh yes, there's been a worldwide move to make the system more risk-based, because really meat inspection is a little more than quality control. But of course, meat is traded on the basis that everyone does the same, and so it's very difficult for one country to move and still maintain its training position. Some of the people in Australia, for instance, they have taken the meat inspection in-house, in poultry plants in this country. It's quite allowable for operators to do their own meat inspection, with the presence of the OV being there for welfare. You don't mention words here. You say that the Food Standards Agency is deeply bureaucratic and inefficient, with multiple layers of management idling and administrative processes adding unnecessary costs. So which bits of it would you cut? Well, there are two problems with the current costs of FSA. One is inefficiency, and the other is they charge for things that other countries don't charge for. I think the inefficiency stems from dual management. The OVs and half the meat inspectors are supplied by a third party. That third party supplies its own management over those people, and then FSA supplies another layer of management over those people to ensure that the contract is being delivered properly. Those costs shouldn't be passed to industry, but they are being. The system, though, has got more expensive to provide. Isn't it fair that you should pay, not taxpayers? Industry can only pay what it can afford to pay. I mean, if it were good value for money, I would say, why not? But it isn't good value for money. What would be the impact if the charges are passed on in full? Two up it was. I would say that at least half the slaughterhouses in the UK would close, and that would be weighted towards the smaller and the medium-sized. The larger ones will survive, of course. But it would wipe out the small and medium-sized slaughterhouses. Peter Hewson from the Association of Independent Meat Suppliers. Rebecca Sudworth is policy director at the Food Standards Agency. She says this is a consultation process. Each year we work really closely with the meat industry and other stakeholders on the setting of charges for the year ahead. So this isn't a new process. We do know, however, that costs are going up, and also for the FSA, in particular, the costs of recruiting and retaining vets have also risen. So we've been really honest about the likelihood that costs will rise next year. And as we do every year, we're going to be working really closely with industry to give us their views about the impacts of the discounts that we currently offer. But as you've just heard, the meat industry say you're charging too much already. You could go up to 10 times more than they charge in France, for instance, and that you are fundamentally a bureaucratic and inefficient organisation. Well, look, I can't comment on the costs in the EU. Our system of meat inspection is very closely based on the EU system. This system of inspection is a very fundamental underpinning for the safety and quality of our food, and we think that it provides very, very good value. But you were also criticised for having two layers of management you're charging for things that aren't charged for abroad. You are, as they said, inefficient. I would strongly dispute that. If you look at the size of the meat industry, which is worth about £11 billion a year, our total charges last year were around £40 million after discounts. And that is a very small amount compared with the value of the sector. Having safe, high quality food and our meat is produced to very high standards in this country is really important. And it's absolutely right that businesses pay for this service. We're an extremely transparent organisation. It's absolutely right that the way in which we regulate is scrutinised. And we're very open to that. We have no interest in being inefficient. It's important to us to be regulating in the most effective way. What do you consider moving to what Peter Hewson described as a more risk-based system, and perhaps allowing people to take things in-house as he put it? So that's not for now. So we have two priorities at the moment. We'll be setting the charges for next year, which is something that we do each year. We'll be working closely with the industry on that. And we're also taking the opportunity through our consultation to invite comments on how the current system of discounts is working. Ames and other organisations like the Rare Breed Survival Trust say the reality here is that if you put more costs, particularly on smaller medium-sized abattoirs, you will simply put them out of business. Do you share that concern? Well, we share the concern to make sure that our costs are fair, and they reflect the value that the service provides to the industry. So when we provide a discount, as we do, and we do recognise that smaller businesses may have more difficulty in meeting some of these costs, it's really important that we have the evidence about why that is helpful, why that is good for consumers, good for taxpayers, good for industry. And that's exactly why we've launched this consultation. We really want to hear about the benefits of those discounts, as well as some of the problems that can arise. Rebecca Sudworth from the Food Standards Agency, that consultation is open until the 24th of this month. That's it from us, I'm Charlotte Smith, the producer is Rebecca Rooney, and farming today this week is a BBC Audio Bristol Production. Hey, I hear you think podcasts are all about true crime, huh? Well, wise guy, the iHeartRadio app's got all kinds of podcasts. We got stuff you should know and stuff they don't want you to know. We got Bobby Bones, Big Boy and Lou Lader, we got SpongeBob, binge pants, and exotic erotic story time. We got doe boys, two dudes in the kitchen, green eggs and dans. Hey, we got Elf Quest, we got podcasts for everything on the iHeartRadio app for free. If you don't download that, well, that's not just a true crime, my friend, that's criminal.