Concerned about Red Tractor collapse.

Humble Village Farmer

Member
BASE UK Member
Location
Essex
Yes we get audited by Tesco on top etc but without RT I would be concerned about the baseline requirement.

I have yet to see a supermarket sell anything British which did not carry the red tractor but concede that they are clearly happy selling non British non red tractor stuff. Conversely there are the non-British, red tractor assured vegetables…

like I say not perfect but a basis to work from.
Sainsbury and M&S don't use the red tractor brand but sell British.
 

Wigeon

Member
Arable Farmer
As an aside, my audit is usually first/second week in Jan. Livens up post christmas blues. Anyway, this year I've not heard a thing. Have they actually copped it? Anyone else in this boat?
 

Flat 10

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Fen Edge
Clive hasn’t had one for almost 2 years I believe?! I’m sure that’s what he said elsewhere. I enjoyed the letter in this weeks FW , I’m told I won’t get in trouble for posting.
330A66DD-FFCF-4FAB-A719-E962140C7C7A.jpeg
 

Highashgrange

Member
Arable Farmer
Speaking to a farming friend in Oxford and he’s not had an inspection for 18 months. Apparently RT can’t get the inspectors. Certainly doesn’t look good for them and as a sinking ship who’s going to hand over the fee knowing there’s a real chance it’ll go under.
 

Humble Village Farmer

Member
BASE UK Member
Location
Essex
Thanks for the reply.

You are right, a lot of what I said I'm not certain is absolute fact.

For a start, I don't know whether Frontier for instance are members of the NFU, or Sainsbury or Tesco, or my local feed mill, flour mill or agchem supplier such as Origin fertiliser who own Agrii. What about British Sugar or Central Wool Growers, are they members?

And if you dare admit that any of the above are members, what's their membership fee? Because some of these corporations also co-own the British Retail Consortium, (co owners of the dead tractor alongside the NFU), and membership fees in the tens or even hundreds of thousands, for a chance to influence policy at NFU, AIC, and the dead tractor, would be hard to turn down, compared to a few hundred smackers from the average hairy arsed farmer with a couple of hundred acres. You can afford to pee a few of them off in exchange for a Sainsbury or a Tesco subscription.

You see my point? The whole system looks absolutely rotten to me and set up to fleece the farmer and consumer. But then I can't say for sure because it's all kept very quite and under wraps. Without evidence on membership, it's difficult not to be suspicious of their motives.

Happy Christmas and have a good 2022 on the farm.
Maybe still "looking into" my question about non farmer members...
 

Drillman

Member
Mixed Farmer
Speaking to a farming friend in Oxford and he’s not had an inspection for 18 months. Apparently RT can’t get the inspectors. Certainly doesn’t look good for them and as a sinking ship who’s going to hand over the fee knowing there’s a real chance it’ll go under.
Talking to 2 folks today and they both said the same.

besides who would want the job knowing the farmer is going to give you a hard time over the pointless mess of it all and that there isn’t any long term job security
 

Clive

Staff Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Lichfield
Talking to 2 folks today and they both said the same.

besides who would want the job knowing the farmer is going to give you a hard time over the pointless mess of it all and that there isn’t any long term job security

It's a rubbish job, the guys we have had hates the scheme as much as I do, he sits there telling me how flawed it is, it pays badly for the assessors and is a thankless task
 

Grass And Grain

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Yorks
Speaking to a farming friend in Oxford and he’s not had an inspection for 18 months. Apparently RT can’t get the inspectors. Certainly doesn’t look good for them and as a sinking ship who’s going to hand over the fee knowing there’s a real chance it’ll go under.
I was talking to someone today, they hadn't had an inspection for over 2 years. They're supposed to do it every 18 months.
If it had been the farmer underperforming, then we'd have been suspended, stickers revoked, not able to trade.
Talking to 2 folks today and they both said the same.

besides who would want the job knowing the farmer is going to give you a hard time over the pointless mess of it all and that there isn’t any long term job security
Bizarre, I was talking to 2 chaps today about exactly same thing ;)
 

Drillman

Member
Mixed Farmer
I was talking to someone today, they hadn't had an inspection for over 2 years. They're supposed to do it every 18 months.
If it had been the farmer underperforming, then we'd have been suspended, stickers revoked, not able to trade.

Bizarre, I was talking to 2 chaps today about exactly same thing ;)
Bizarrely both the chaps I was talking to arrived in my yard and had to put there big coats on😂😂😂 then proceeded to tell me how much better my rented farm was than theres which they owned😂😂😂

We did all agree though that red tractor have a unclimbable mountain to attempt to scale to win back farmers trust in them.
 

Grass And Grain

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Yorks
did all agree though that red tractor have a unclimbable mountain to attempt to scale to win back farmers trust in them.

I was on top of a mountain today. Said -1 on car dash, then +1 when I got back to poor mans' land at bottom of the hill.

Really wouldn't surprise me if existing cereal assurance schemes collapse from lack of inspectors and annoyed customers who are sick of mission creep gold plating.

They just haven't listened to farmers. More and more and more daft rules rubber stamped by various processors. The very same processors who allow imports without any equivalent assurance.

How could they think this was tenable, and that the peasants wouldn't start an uprising?
 
Last edited:
Speaking to a farming friend in Oxford and he’s not had an inspection for 18 months. Apparently RT can’t get the inspectors. Certainly doesn’t look good for them and as a sinking ship who’s going to hand over the fee knowing there’s a real chance it’ll go under.


Great. Can't wait. We must continue to break down their credibility, make sure those who want a job in them are aware of how much we detest their doublespeak of Red Tractor and that it is not an honest career.
 

SFI - What % were you taking out of production?

  • 0 %

    Votes: 79 42.2%
  • Up to 25%

    Votes: 65 34.8%
  • 25-50%

    Votes: 30 16.0%
  • 50-75%

    Votes: 3 1.6%
  • 75-100%

    Votes: 3 1.6%
  • 100% I’ve had enough of farming!

    Votes: 7 3.7%

Red Tractor drops launch of green farming scheme amid anger from farmers

  • 1,289
  • 1
As reported in Independent


quote: “Red Tractor has confirmed it is dropping plans to launch its green farming assurance standard in April“

read the TFF thread here: https://thefarmingforum.co.uk/index.php?threads/gfc-was-to-go-ahead-now-not-going-ahead.405234/
Top