New information about local nature recovery and landscape recovery

Humble Village Farmer · Jan 18, 2022

tepapa said:
And instead of talking to farmers and saying, we know we've not really looked after you very well in the past but we've gone and set some climate targets we need to meet and we can't do that without your help, they're trying to do it on the sly for peanuts.

If throwing £3bn a year at farmers with limited strings attached is your idea of not looking after them very well, then I'd like to be on your Christmas present list.

I do agree, by the way that it hasn't gone well for farmers as it has prevented development of the industry.

tepapa · Jan 18, 2022

Humble Village Farmer said:
If throwing £3bn a year at farmers with limited strings attached is your idea of not looking after them very well, then I'd like to be on your Christmas present list.

I do agree, by the way that it hasn't gone well for farmers as it has prevented development of the industry.

No I was more thinking tb control, and recently signing up to trade deals to ag's detriment.

In the recent years the £3bilion has been for land ownership not farming.

egbert · Jan 18, 2022

Two Tone said:
Maybe, but we sequester many, many time more than we emit. That is how food is made.

It seems to me that we are constantly being drip fed all the bad things we allegedly do. So much so that even we believe them, unchallenged.

Let’s face it, our industry has been in a mess. We are running round harder and harder in ever decreasing circles, trying to make it viable and it can be very difficult, if not impossible to make it profitable without something like BPS.

And now, ELMs is yet another kick in the teeth to most of us!

It is also obvious that Harry Metcalfe cannot make a living for himself and his son on the 450 acres they farm and substantially rely on outside income. The only thing I might fault him on is the fact that many who watch his channel will naturally think that all farmers are like this and that all of us are quite happy to continue run their farms as a sort of charity, providing cheap food (And sequestering CO2 for free!) as if we are some sort of “benevolent fund”!

Are we sure about that?

I'm not.

Any carbon i might be sequestering is then in a fairly short loop.
a bit like cow-burp-methane.

There is almost nothing I can do with the carbon I capture that is remotely like the previous security of the oil/gas/coal gave, before it was extracted for me to use as oil/diesel/wrap/fert etc etc etc.

That said, I won't accept much blame given what the rest of society get up to.
And the 'nature friendly' bollix and carbon trading/capturing stuff is only wallpapering over the reality.

Grass And Grain · Jan 18, 2022

Humble Village Farmer said:
It's catch 22 though isn't it? Staff cut to the bone so no spare time to develop nice little retail schemes on the side.

How are the heifers doing by the way?

All good and healthy. Steady bit of income, which I quite like.

ajd132 · Jan 18, 2022

Vader said:
They give it to dole muppets who happily don't work and give nothing back.
A least farmers provide food for their tax money.

Nothing to do with food production. Like Henerar said on this thread early he likes the bps because he can spend it on hobbies, and Yorkshiretom said he wants it and doesn’t want to have to change his business that would be loss making without it. What a great state this industry is in.

britishblue · Jan 18, 2022

I actually don't think £3billion is that much for what farmers do in looking after the landscape and producing food. Just have a look at how many billion the railways were subsidised last year. A subsidy for the few.It doesn't take me to work in the morning and I have to pay licence .insurance,fuel and buy a car!!

Hindsight · Jan 18, 2022

egbert said:
Are we sure about that?

I'm not.

Any carbon i might be sequestering is then in a fairly short loop.
a bit like cow-burp-methane.

There is almost nothing I can do with the carbon I capture that is remotely like the previous security of the oil/gas/coal gave, before it was extracted for me to use as oil/diesel/wrap/fert etc etc etc.

That said, I won't accept much blame given what the rest of society get up to.
And the 'nature friendly' bollix and carbon trading/capturing stuff is only wallpapering over the reality.

The reality, well said.

An aside. A couple of years ago I was looking at 'bog oaks' piled up on the side of a Fenland field on the edge of Bourne. And looking at the profile of a recently reprofiled drainage ditch. The ditch was about 6 foot depth. Their was an upper layer of black peaty soil about 30 cm depth. It is 50% Organic Matter (I know as have had it tested when submitting a standard soil analysis test). It will blow away if given the chance. So since around 1750 when this land was drained considerable Carbon has been lost to the atmosphere. This was from the peat laid down during the Iron Age period until Medieval period. But below that was a layer of clay about 40 cm deep and then another layer of Peat about 20 cm deep from around late Neolithic period and then another layer of clay before a third layer of Peat in the very bottom of the ditch just caught with the digger from an earlier period of the Neolithic. And the ruling elite talk about sequestering carbon to save the planet and doing it in 20 years. I just reflect on such timescales with bafflement. Hey ho.

wanton dwarf · Jan 18, 2022

Grass And Grain said:
We'll make a start on that by gaining access to our markets at least cost, and forming a food assurance structure which either accepts a base standard, or pays a genuine premium if said mill wishes to have a plethora of assurance and environmental standards.

The Danes get closer to their marketplace with successful cooperatives, so why can't we.

Really I ought to be selling my SSSI pesticide free hay in little bags to pet owners. Maybe rolling oats and selling to horse owners, or wheat to backyard chicken keepers etc. atm we make more brass for the time involved by servicing vacuum coolers and selling cold stores to the veg boys. So we'll probably concentrate on that (rather than putting hay in little bags), but we should really put more effort into adding value to our ag produce.

Suppose I'm my own worst enemy by not growing milling wheat, but on our scale have decided the crop segregation isn't worth the bother. Absolutely think it is if you have flour mills in proximity and can often hit milling premiums. We have good demand and £10 North East premiums for feed wheat. Sedamyl at Selby, Vivergo at Hull, big pig area, Cramswick expanding pig herd all the time, Mosey pigs, not far to beef regions.

All very interesting though, and gives us a reason to go to work on a morning.

Pretty much what I've been saying for years.

Individually it will be a bit hit and miss. However, if a contracts system could be raised bureacratically and then handed out to farmers it might work.

However Greed is the problem, for some reason we always end up with gutter snipes at the top.

wanton dwarf · Jan 18, 2022

egbert said:
Are we sure about that?

I'm not.

Any carbon i might be sequestering is then in a fairly short loop.
a bit like cow-burp-methane.

There is almost nothing I can do with the carbon I capture that is remotely like the previous security of the oil/gas/coal gave, before it was extracted for me to use as oil/diesel/wrap/fert etc etc etc.

That said, I won't accept much blame given what the rest of society get up to.
And the 'nature friendly' bollix and carbon trading/capturing stuff is only wallpapering over the reality.

Why would you compare food & life with fossilised carbons ?

Do we really need to sequester Carbon anyway ? No, we don't. The reality is temperatures could rise several degrees in the UK and the net result would be a decrease in Carbon usage.

The problem - if any - is in areas of the world of already high heat. I don't see ANY evidence that world governments are concerned or doing anything to reduce temperatures in those regions.

Even building a canal and salt lake inland would help.

IMHO if someone cries Wolf and then does nothing to solve the problems - there is no problem. There is an alterior motive.

I'd point out another VERY obvious discrepancy with the cr@p about Woodland creation. IF Carbon Sequestration is important, then wood for building materials would be a priority. So Carbon could then be sequestered in property for 100s of years.

That's not happening.

delilah · Jan 18, 2022

britishblue said:
I actually don't think £3billion is that much for what farmers do in looking after the landscape and producing food.

It is less than the taxpayer spends on topping up the wages paid to their checkout staff by the cartel. It is the best value for money the taxpayer gets out of all the interventions made in the food chain. It will continue to deliver a tremendous amount of public good once Defra get the design of ELMS right.

wanton dwarf · Jan 18, 2022

delilah said:
It is less than the taxpayer spends on topping up the wages paid to their checkout staff by the cartel. It is the best value for money the taxpayer gets out of all the interventions made in the food chain. It will continue to deliver a tremendous amount of public good once Defra get the design of ELMS right.

I don't see any evidence that anything HMG does produces "Public Good" as the main driver.

It's all about short term gain with some propaganda driven excuse.

The current wood planting schemes pay for "NEW" woodland. That means it's profitable for landowners to destroy existing woodland. The whole policy is cr@p.

delilah · Jan 18, 2022

wanton dwarf said:
I don't see any evidence that anything HMG does produces "Public Good" as the main driver.

It doesn't have to be the main driver for it to be so. Once they get the design of ELMS right, the biggest benefits will be seen in ways that Defra doesn't start to comprehend.

DRC · Jan 18, 2022

Have they thought about where all these tree saplings will come from and the labour to plant them. This post doing the rounds on FB tells its own story. Woodland trust don’t want them .

Two Tone · Jan 18, 2022

egbert said:
Are we sure about that?

I'm not.

Any carbon i might be sequestering is then in a fairly short loop.
a bit like cow-burp-methane.

There is almost nothing I can do with the carbon I capture that is remotely like the previous security of the oil/gas/coal gave, before it was extracted for me to use as oil/diesel/wrap/fert etc etc etc.

That said, I won't accept much blame given what the rest of society get up to.
And the 'nature friendly' bollix and carbon trading/capturing stuff is only wallpapering over the reality.

Yes, I’m reasonably sure about it, though I’d like to see some proper research about it all.

As yet, I haven’t ventured down the Carbon trading route. But those who are buying, must think there is, or they wouldn’t be buying it.

I suppose one way of looking at it is like this:
Work out what the energy value of all you produce, which in may case is what the calorific energy of all the grain in my Grainstore is when full each year, then deduct the total energy it took to grow it. It is the photosynthesis process which is makes the total grain energy value exceed the energy value of growing it.

There is a policy of polluter pays, which in the case of the food that is eaten by those we grew it for, are responsible, not us. No matter how short lived the loop is.

A few years ago I did calculate that this 750 acre farm captured not far short of 10,000 tonnes of CO2 each year from the atmosphere.
I’m pretty sure it never took anything like as much CO2 to capture it .
No doubt we are heading towards the day when we all need to make these calculations.
But worst of all, so those we grow it for can feel better about the damage they want to continue to create!

topground · Jan 18, 2022

Two Tone said:
Yes, I’m reasonably sure about it, though I’d like to see some proper research about it all.

As yet, I haven’t ventured down the Carbon trading route. But those who are buying, must think there is, or they wouldn’t be buying it.

I suppose one way of looking at it is like this:
Work out what the energy value of all you produce, which in may case is what the calorific energy of all the grain in my Grainstore is when full each year, then deduct the total energy it took to grow it. It is the photosynthesis process which is makes the total grain energy value exceed the energy value of growing it.

There is a policy of polluter pays, which in the case of the food that is eaten by those we grew it for, are responsible, not us. No matter how short lived the loop is.

A few years ago I did calculate that this 750 acre farm captured not far short of 10,000 tonnes of CO2 each year from the atmosphere.
I’m pretty sure it never took anything like as much CO2 to capture it .
No doubt we are heading towards the day when we all need to make these calculations.
But worst of all, so those we grow it for can feel better about the damage they want to continue to create!

I suspect the Carbon calculations will be done by in much the same way as the calculations for the derivatives of aggregated sub prime mortgages that led to the last financial crash. Everyone plies in because everyone else is piling in without understanding what is going on but it must be a good thing because everyone else is making money. Crypto currency is another example of folk buying in because it looks a winner but no one understands it. It will all end badly for the little man while the schemers who started it are long gone away to count their millions.

steveR · Jan 18, 2022

silverfox said:
Have they thought about where all these tree saplings will come from and the labour to plant them. This post doing the rounds on FB tells its own story. Woodland trust don’t want them .View attachment 1010780 View attachment 1010781

No profit for them I suspect...

Vader · Jan 18, 2022

ajd132 said:
Nothing to do with food production. Like Henerar said on this thread early he likes the bps because he can spend it on hobbies, and Yorkshiretom said he wants it and doesn’t want to have to change his business that would be loss making without it. What a great state this industry is in.

Lot of farms are not in the lucky position to change their business...
We can not grow much else than what we grow.
Nothing to diversify into when your in a deprived area.
Old outcrop land like some of ours won't yield enough to make hardly any profit most years.
It was brought into production via subsidys to feed the nation.
Without subsidy, lot of our rented land won't be viable to grow crops unless rent is massively reduced and we don't pay silly rent either..

BrianV · Jan 18, 2022

ajd132 said:
Nothing to do with food production. Like Henerar said on this thread early he likes the bps because he can spend it on hobbies, and Yorkshiretom said he wants it and doesn’t want to have to change his business that would be loss making without it. What a great state this industry is in.

Seems to me the UK has more miles of field hedges than any other European country yet we seem to be the ones getting beat up over rewilding, for a lot of us much of previous payments are there because we are forced to look after & maintain those same hedges that we are not allowed to remove, is there any other of our competitors that have the same handicap?

Jonp · Jan 18, 2022

We could rewild a lot of gardens if the number of cats was reduced. Be cheaper than any elms sub.

topground · Jan 18, 2022

Apparently DEFRA are exploring the role Land Management Plans could play as part of any future scheme. Those who have signed up for the pilot scheme will be expected to produce a land management plan in the first few months of the agreement.
It appears that Natural England have their fingerprints all over this. Can any one who has signed up to the pilot give their view?
How many hours at your hourly rate will the £5K bribe to take part pay for and how many hours will this first stage of the pilot take up?
@Clive is the only one I recall who has confirmed signing up.

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