Written by John Swire
The National Chairman of the Tenant Farmers Association (TFA), James Gray, has said that the farming industry and the supply chains into which it feeds must be ‘match fit’ to both capitalise on the opportunities of life outside the European Union, as well as tackling the inevitable challenges that will arise.
“Whatever our thoughts about Brexit, the Prime Minister now has the Parliamentary arithmetic in his favour to confirm the UK’s exit from the European Union at the end of January. Through the eleven-month transition period to follow, we must focus not only on achieving a good trade deal with the EU, but in ramping up our efforts to secure new export markets for our farming output further afield. As important as the domestic and EU markets are, we must work harder to sell ourselves more internationally. To this end, AHDB should concentrate its efforts in promoting market development,” said Mr Gray.
“We also need the Government to be working with us rather than against us. Allowing imports of food produced to standards which are illegal in the UK would be a catastrophe. The Government must not undermine our domestic market in attempting to gain market share for our financial services sector abroad. If our animal welfare and environmental standards are important to us, we must protect them at our borders. The Government must use a combination of regulatory standards and tariffs on imports to put our domestically produced, high quality food in the strongest position in trade terms. As a mark of the Government’s support for our industry, it should require all public bodies involved in food procurement to prioritise food from domestic sources,” said Mr Gray.
“Retail and food service supply chains will also continue to need strong regulation to ensure fair treatment of primary producers. Indications from the outgoing Groceries Code Adjudicator that her role could continue on a part-time basis because of the successes she has achieved, are at best premature and at worst naïve. By including supply chain measures in the previous Agriculture Bill the Government has recognised the need for a widening and deepening of the regulatory framework. We need a full-time adjudicator doing a full-time job across the whole of the retail and food service supply chains from farm to fork,” said Mr Gray.
“Within the tenanted sector of agriculture, we will also be looking to the Government to put in place much needed reforms to the legislative and taxation frameworks within which agricultural tenancies operate. We need greater security of tenure to promote productivity and better environmental outcomes, opportunities for progression and new entrants, as well as routes to dignified retirement for those tenant farmers reaching the end of their farming careers. Directing all new policies and schemes to the needs of active farmers will be key,” said Mr Gray.
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