Careful where you cap the subsidy MrGove

[neilo]

I am just going to lay a short hedge, and fence it. I will get about £1000 for that. If I were to tell my colleagues at work, that I will get that money, to improve my field, paid for from their taxes, I think they would be dumbfounded! I dare say, people could take the view, that I own a property that could be beyond their dreams, why should I be paid to improve it!

It doesn't really improve your property or make you any money though, other than making it look nicer. I have an offlying block of 60ac that was originally in 16 fields. Every local farmer that I've spoken to has told me that I'd be better off clearing out the remnants of the hedges (it's been ranched for years), but I've just about finished refencing it all back up now, and Glastir has helped with some of the more recent hedgelaying/gapping up.
Financially it's been a big commitment, but it has re-established a maze of wildlife corridors and maintained the patchwork of pasture land clearly visible for the general public to enjoy from the road (they can feck off if they think they might ever set foot on that patch though). The only benefit I get is the ease or rotational grazing on that block, and the benefits to grazing quality that brings.
Economically, I'd have been better to have left the field boundaries as they were, getting slowly destroyed, and throw some electric fencing up (which is mostly sat idle in the shed all summer) when I needed to.

The Glastir money is just about paying the costs of doing the work, not even that if you pay a contractor to do it, and purposely has no profit element attached.

 

[DRC]

If they make the environmental payments attractive enough, with no cap on how much you can put in, then rather than wall to wall wheat, it might pay better to do wall to wall enviro options, especially on the farms riddled with black grass .

 

[Brisel]

If they make the environmental payments attractive enough, with no cap on how much you can put in, then rather than wall to wall wheat, it might pay better to do wall to wall enviro options, especially on the farms riddled with black grass .

Current CS schemes aren't exactly lucrative - I anticipate a 20% loss on the Higher Tier I've just applied for, but that's not the reason for applying for it. Like for setaside, taking more marginal land out of production might be better for the books if you can reduce overheads to compensate for that lost production by expanding, restucturing or just accepting a lower profit/acre in return for better timeliness/time saving.

 

[Clive]

since when was wall to wall continuous wheat a good idea anyway regardless of subs ?

I think the importance and profitable nature of a rotation was recognised long before subs were ever thought of

 

[renewablejohn]

Just hope it applies to all farmers and does not exclude market gardeners with less than 5 hectares of eligible land who actually put veg on the table and feed the country.

 

[Hindsight]

Anyone read Stephen Carrs article in last Friday Farmers Weekly.