Dairying & Red Tractor

[Bald Rick]

OK boys & girls. Some of you do venture out of this forum to "Agricultural Matters" where you will no doubt have seen many threads on Red Tractor (RT).
However there has been little input from us dairy farmers - probably due to the fact that most, if not all, our supply contracts state that we must be RT adherents in order to supply our chosen processor.

Do those of you in the sunny uplands of an Arla contract have to undertake their own Arlagarden audit which I assume is more pertinent than any RT inspection?

So the question I ask is, do you feel you are getting a fair deal from RT or are they now overstepping their remit?

Poll attached but comments are useful as it does appear NFU/RT read the forum

 

[bigw]

RT are trying to keep up with the higher standards that a 'premium' contract requires but in doing so will add a huge burden to people on a 'standard' contract who have no way of recovering this from the market place. Also there is a large amount of duplication in their standards, checking statutory requirements like movements etc are pretty pointless as we already have to comply to these or you don't get BPS.

 

[Bramble]

One reason why a local farm packed up last year after supposedly having a Tesco audit, Arlagarden inspection, RT inspection, Dairy Hygiene Inspection, and a visit from Trading Standards all in the same month.

Probably not the only reason they stopped but I’m amazed they had time to fit them all in.

RT felt a bit pointless when I was chucking milk away last year

 

[buffalo_soldier]

The narrative in Agricultural Matters is a crops centric one.

The whole thing needs a bonfire though, it's gone too far to scale back.

Who in their right mind does something for 2 decades and instead of addressing why it doesn't work, just plow ahead and make it worse.
The consultation was so biased I found it insulting.

They could have narrowed it down to one question and saved themselves some time.
1) Is Red Tractor:
A. Awesome.
B. Totally awesome.

Please answer to continue

 

[sjt01]

We find the questions Arlagaarden ask tend to be useful management info for ourselves. I would be happy to ditch RT for AG+, the various policies and risk assessments for RT are only to show the auditor, I would be surprised if one farmer looked at them between inspections.
I am now doing the climate assessment, the questions could be better framed and organised, but it is all sensible management info for our own use as well, unlike RT.

 

[Will Blackburn]

One reason why a local farm packed up last year after supposedly having a Tesco audit, Arlagarden inspection, RT inspection, Dairy Hygiene Inspection, and a visit from Trading Standards all in the same month.

Probably not the only reason they stopped but I’m amazed they had time to fit them all in.

RT felt a bit pointless when I was chucking milk away last year

Better if they come on the same day.

 

[Davy]

When you see an inspector sniffing soap to see if there's a scent when it clearly says unscented on the bottle you do scratch your head

 

[___\0/___]

The Scottish NFU zoom meeting on the new standards is tomorrow night at 7.30 (details on their Facebook page) you are meant to watch this video first. https://eur02.safelinks.protection....2DVQhuRfWcHgmsS5sMDNCLtdlCfsB0OYo=&reserved=0

 

[NoParticularPattern]

^Waves from the sunny uplands^

In this establishment it’s me who does the (endless) paperwork, webinars, box ticking etc etc associated with AG/AG+/Climate Check/RT so here’s my two pence for you. The fact that there’s so many bits to fill in that all overlap is a pain in my backside and gets very confusing when they all start talking in different units/formats/double negatives etc. None of them seem willing or able to communicate with each other in order to make it possible to ditch one in favour of the other. The questions overlap massively but yet not one of them will admit to it and suggest that they could work centrally. So you end up with several deadlines, visits or video calls all of which result in the same thing.

As you say we are bound by our contract to be RT assured, but we are also now contractually required to fill in the same questions and agree to another visit (or two!) only to have the questions in green rather than red. It begs the question- if RT are as relevant and beneficial as RT claim to be, why have Arla decided to check up on them?

 

[NoParticularPattern]

Oh and yes. The AG questions are far more pertinent to our business than the RT endless form filling exercise will ever be. Quite frankly I’m far more interested in what our milk buyer wants to know and see (who presumably does actual consumer/market research for themselves) than some organisation which seems to exist purely to tell everyone how marvellous they are without any actual evidence of their effect on prices.

 

[Sid]

When you see an inspector sniffing soap to see if there's a scent when it clearly says unscented on the bottle you do scratch your head

That's sniff and scratch, not scratch and sniff

 

[Bald Rick]

I see that to date 38 have voted

37 yes
1 no

 

[bigw]

I see that to date 38 have voted

37 yes
1 no

I wonder if the 1 no will own up!!

 

[Bald Rick]

I wonder if the 1 no will own up!!

Probably @Beef farmer ... he likes to be contrary

 

[Beef farmer]

We need to be the best. But on some aspects they are overstepping the mark and are way out of touch

 

[Bald Rick]

We need to be the best. But on some aspects they are overstepping the mark and are way out of touch

I think this is the nub.

I don’t object to having some independent monitoring- albeit our milk is checked daily by NML and our buyer regularly comes to the farm - but some of the stuff now forming part of RT is a nonsense

 

[Beef farmer]

I think this is the nub.

I don’t object to having some independent monitoring- albeit our milk is checked daily by NML and our buyer regularly comes to the farm - but some of the stuff now forming part of RT is a nonsense

Our milk buyers standards are much more apt for production of quality milk, a tidy farm and healthy cows.

RT just make up more sh1t to keep them selves busy. About 60% is relevant.

 

[sidjon]

Got my red tractor Friday and neighbour has cut through the landline cable for 3 third time 12 months banking up a hedge, took six weeks to reconnect last time

 

[Jamer]

It's the duplication, with a box ticking assessor who is not interested in the data you supply, that I resent. We are on an aligned contract with all the resultant hoops. However, the data collated by the milk buyer is used to identify areas for on farm improvements in health, welfare and efficiency.

 

[Headless chicken]

We need to be the best, the issue with RT is how in the hell do some places keep passing? Yet god forbid you don’t wash the tank well enough you need a whole tub of Vaseline.
Also how is something not an issue one visit then all of a sudden it is on the next