CFA's Post BPS

AlfM

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Norfolk
Anyone prepared a new contract farming agreement with post BPS in mind? What changes do you anticipate they'll be in them. Been a fairly standard document for years with so much for farmer, so much for contractor and a % split of profits. Usually the BPS has been in there in the past perhaps? What now?
 

Brisel

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Midlands
Interesting question. If you believe that the landholder’s charge is underwritten by BPS then the figures need looking at. There will still be the inevitable comparison to a FBT rent. What are recent FBT levels like? Nothing to test the water around here.

Ultimately, there has to be something for both parties. There’s £94/acre less in the account to share and the environmental schemes will cover less than a third of that deficit by the time the costs are taken into account.
 

D14

Member
Anyone prepared a new contract farming agreement with post BPS in mind? What changes do you anticipate they'll be in them. Been a fairly standard document for years with so much for farmer, so much for contractor and a % split of profits. Usually the BPS has been in there in the past perhaps? What now?

We had a CFA up till 2019 when the land owner decided to sell. He's just in the process of trying to buy a new farm and asked if we would CF it. I did the sums and went back to him basically saying if its to be done right with ditching and hedge cutting etc included then its a straight 70:30 profit split in our favour which includes BPS until its totally gone. He did his sums and came back to me saying he's pulled out of the deal as he'd now had second thoughts!
 

midlandslad

Member
Location
Midlands
We had a CFA up till 2019 when the land owner decided to sell. He's just in the process of trying to buy a new farm and asked if we would CF it. I did the sums and went back to him basically saying if its to be done right with ditching and hedge cutting etc included then its a straight 70:30 profit split in our favour which includes BPS until its totally gone. He did his sums and came back to me saying he's pulled out of the deal as he'd now had second thoughts!
There isn't large profits to be had in the job over a reasonable term. Ok you might drop lucky every now and again but over a 10 year average the return on capital is poor.

Where are you based?
 

ajd132

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Suffolk
Interesting question. If you believe that the landholder’s charge is underwritten by BPS then the figures need looking at. There will still be the inevitable comparison to a FBT rent. What are recent FBT levels like? Nothing to test the water around here.

Ultimately, there has to be something for both parties. There’s £94/acre less in the account to share and the environmental schemes will cover less than a third of that deficit by the time the costs are taken into account.
Rents have been dropping around here from what I’ve heard. Not the full amount of the bps loss though.
I guess the way I see it is we are in a long term relationship with most of our cfa’s so we share the pain to a degree.
we have to make zero till/low overhead farming work in order for it to stack. But there is absolutely no way we could make a ploughing/full till system pay on a cfa without bps in normal years with rotations now much wider than they used to be, not without basically taking all the profit where it would be better for them to stick it all into a long term stewardship for their return. we benchmark where we are in our cfa’s against land agents overall figures so I know we aren’t doing a bad job.
I think many contract farmers need to have a serious look at their costs and do some flexing of potential incomes. Account for family labour and work out how much their own farms are subsiding others! We’ve been there and done it, got to be brutally honest.
 

farmerfred86

Member
BASIS
Location
Suffolk
We have just reduced rent on one FBT. The high grain prices are very convenient at the moment for agents but already dropping back towards the higher cost of production. We are planning for a mix of carbon, stewardship and ELMS but there is so much happening in the world right how its difficult to plan!
 

snarling bee

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Bedfordshire
I will be having a conversation with many of my customers in the next 12 months. But its not going to be easy. We beat published CFA figures almost always, but we are growing a lot of milling wheat and fewer breaks. At the end of the day I cannot take out any less from their farms unless they want me to cut back on machinery and labour and take a greater risk with their crops when the season goes against us.
For me the difficult bit will be fitting in the SFI options or not; who will get the payments and who will bear the cost?
 

Salopian_Will

Member
BASE UK Member
Location
Shropshire
I will be having a conversation with many of my customers in the next 12 months. But its not going to be easy. We beat published CFA figures almost always, but we are growing a lot of milling wheat and fewer breaks. At the end of the day I cannot take out any less from their farms unless they want me to cut back on machinery and labour and take a greater risk with their crops when the season goes against us.
For me the difficult bit will be fitting in the SFI options or not; who will get the payments and who will bear the cost?
SFI payments are different to BPS in that they are coupled to agricultural work/practices. The landowner will be bearing the cost, whether it is in the contract charge or an addition, but the income derived should go into the pot for division.
 

SFI - What % were you taking out of production?

  • 0 %

    Votes: 80 42.3%
  • Up to 25%

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  • 25-50%

    Votes: 30 15.9%
  • 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

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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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