Agricultural crises (another one)

BrianV

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Dartmoor
thoughts



Young people will not want to get involved in farming unless there is the dream of one day farming on their own, that dream has been destroyed by this stupid government’s ELMS scheme where rewilding is all that counts, any young person starting needs the certainty of a base land based payment for farming well to enable them to get started.
Sadly large scale farmers & the NFU have no interest whatever in the next generation getting started on their own, they are only interested in workers for their ever larger estates!
 

BrianV

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Dartmoor
Nice to see that Moretons Morrell ag intake this year is up from 13 students to 29, so more interested youngsters than you might think.
And how many of these eager youngsters do you think unless with farming parents have any hope whatever of farming with their own farm whether owned or rented, farming subsidies of any type whatever they are called need to be capped & the money saved diverted to smaller units, if larger farms are not financially viable then they should not be supported!
 

Iben

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Fife
They were saying that 30 years ago, nothing has changed.

Numbers will be dropping, as has always been the case for hundreds of years.

My best guess is it's the older generation sitting in the office filling out these forms while their offspring are out on the farm working. Senior decides he is still the farmer and puts his age on the form. 🤷

Depends on how the questionnaire was worded.
 

Boysground

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Wiltshire
I have 4 under 20 and 3 more under 25 working here. One is my son, all of them are either doing of have done agriculture or something related at college or uni. Most are gaining experience before they move on as they complete their education.

There does seem to be more young people in this area who want to work in the country, I’m not saying it’s enough but they are around.

The biggest stumbling block to being educated about agriculture is work experience. Many don’t have an agricultural upbringing and need experience. Farmers don’t give these guys jobs, I probably have at least 1 email a week from a student looking for work, if they can’t get the basic experience they won’t stay in the industry to build a cv and career. Then we will all be stuffed.

My daughter works in another industry, she has a degree but to progress she has had to start at the bottom and work up, she will tell you she is cv building and gaining experience to get to where she wants to. The companies she has worked for know her plans and have encouraged her. It doesn’t take much to look on here and see people looking for experienced staff but they all have to start somewhere

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serf

Member
Location
warwickshire
They say the average age thing all the time , the farmer with his name on the till will obviously be older but around here anyway there's loads of kids (next generation) champing at the bit to step up , wonder how they make these numbers up sometimes
 

The Son

Member
Location
Herefordshire
2 youngsters here, one 17 partime, day release and college, the other 21 and harper sandwich student, both can be exasperating at times, but generally I enjoy working with them and seeing them grow and develop as they take on more responsibility.

One comment I will make is the support they are getting from their respective colleges, Harper Adams support both their student and the employer very well. Holme Lacy college, Hereford do not, this is a real shame as the student has grown and improved considerably in his time here and this should be fed back to the college and form part of his qualification.

I agree that we have a major part to play in encouraging the youngsters into our industry, and a great way of doing this is through the local Ag colleges, but our local Ag college needs to up its game.
 

BrianV

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Dartmoor
Young people don't seem to want to do anything though. Shortage of lorry drivers, builders, NHS staff, dentists ( well paid ), abattoir workers, veg pickers.........
Because stupid governments mainly Tory have filled their heads with the idea that they go off to university rack up massive debts which then entitles them to an executive job, if you had a massive debt at their age would you want to start at what they have considered the lower rungs of the ladder
 
"Let's just keep throwing money at our problems and hope they disappear" pretty much sums up the current job market and really intertwines with Einstein's definition of insanity "Doing the same thing over and over again, and expecting different results"

To work in agriculture you need a WANT to work in agriculture.

There are plenty of young un's coming through and plenty who want giving that chance for some experience but every employer wants the ready made perfect employee so a lot fall by the wayside and chose a different path as there is only so many times a door can be closed in your face.

I have tried to give a few a chance over the last few months, only to be let down with continual reliability issues (They all were late teens/early twenty's so I expected a bit of partying). We will have a go with a few more inexperienced ones this year but need time to recover as it is mentally and physically draining training them but it's nice to give someone that 'chance' and that small possibility that they turn into your star employee in the future.
 

BrianV

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Dartmoor
I have 4 under 20 and 3 more under 25 working here. One is my son, all of them are either doing of have done agriculture or something related at college or uni. Most are gaining experience before they move on as they complete their education.

There does seem to be more young people in this area who want to work in the country, I’m not saying it’s enough but they are around.

The biggest stumbling block to being educated about agriculture is work experience. Many don’t have an agricultural upbringing and need experience. Farmers don’t give these guys jobs, I probably have at least 1 email a week from a student looking for work, if they can’t get the basic experience they won’t stay in the industry to build a cv and career. Then we will all be stuffed.

My daughter works in another industry, she has a degree but to progress she has had to start at the bottom and work up, she will tell you she is cv building and gaining experience to get to where she wants to. The companies she has worked for know her plans and have encouraged her. It doesn’t take much to look on here and see people looking for experienced staff but they all have to start somewhere

Bg
Where do these enthusiastic youngsters move on to? Do you think they have any hope of starting on their own or will they drift into other occupation or else work the rest of their lives for ever larger estates, There has to be a way to enable the next generation to get started, & capping all subsidies is at least somewhere to start!
ELMS giving a £500,000 cap on any farm reservoir for just one example is a bloody disgrace!!
 
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bluebell

Member
will it ever go back to the good old days, were most youngsters had part time jobs, in between going to school? me like any other person whos father had a small business was rather encouraged? at a early age 12 to start going into the family firm, sat morning, in school times, in school holidays every working day? but the up side to this was many, money for one, learning the trade from the men for another? started at the bottom making the tea for 12 men, each of which had their own mug, and preference how the tea was, and how many sugars if any? saying all that by sixteen me and my younger brother could by then do many of the skills learnt from the men, and at a commercial speed? Watching the TV programme the yorkshire farm with that large family and how they work and the skills they learn, thats how it used to be for many?
 

Robt

Member
Location
Suffolk
thoughts



We are seeing in all aspects of ag from practical farming to the supply chain. Youngsters just simply aren't interested. Yes there are a few that are but we are massively short of new entrants. Speak to most dealers they will say how they struggle to get new techs let alone keep them.
It will only get worse. Some jobs can be automated out but a lot cant and will be along time before they are. Look the haulage industry....
Its a shame as the youngsters i meet that are involved are a real credit to themselves.
 

SFI - What % were you taking out of production?

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

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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/
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