France to link food prices to farmers’ cost of production!!!

[Agrispeed]

Out of interest what would you do Bossfarmer, if you did get a guaranteed above COP price for your produce? How would it effect your business?

 

[Doc]

Hi @Bossfarmer,
I'm really not sure if you are taking the Mick here or not.
It is a very simple fact that food will always be available in the UK because it is a wealthy country and it's good citizens, employed or not, will all earn enough personally or via the state, to be able to afford something to eat. Yes I know about food banks etc, but the bottom line is it's hardly sub Sarah Africa poverty here due to lack of food production. It's social allocation politics.
You can very often import food items cheaper than they can be produced for in the U.K. It's a climate and space thing. If you have a good climate, say for cattle, and lots of space to keep them, the inputs are less, so too then is the COP. I could make the same argument for lamb, veg, cereals etc.
Don't let this confuse you that the 'standards' aren't as high just because COP is lower. Indeed, the free roaming, grass fed, never housed, and barely interfered with beast from the pampas, veldt, plains and outback may have a significantly better life than the cattle in the north of Scotland. If I was a cow, I know where I'd want to live.
So it's possible, and I'd even say probable that the 'welfare standards' could be higher elsewhere.
It could be easily marketed as such to your peril. Remember the successful Anchor butter ads when they were showing NZ idyllic countryside?
So you may not have the trump marketing card you think and your 'sub' for the 'high standards' you keep mentioning would be payment for a myth.

 

[glasshouse]

Hi @Bossfarmer,
I'm really not sure if you are taking the Mick here or not.
It is a very simple fact that food will always be available in the UK because it is a wealthy country and it's good citizens, employed or not, will all earn enough personally or via the state, to be able to afford something to eat. Yes I know about food banks etc, but the bottom line is it's hardly sub Sarah Africa poverty here due to lack of food production. It's social allocation politics.
You can very often import food items cheaper than they can be produced for in the U.K. It's a climate and space thing. If you have a good climate, say for cattle, and lots of space to keep them, the inputs are less, so too then is the COP. I could make the same argument for lamb, veg, cereals etc.
Don't let this confuse you that the 'standards' aren't as high just because COP is lower. Indeed, the free roaming, grass fed, never housed, and barely interfered with beast from the pampas, veldt, plains and outback may have a significantly better life than the cattle in the north of Scotland. If I was a cow, I know where I'd want to live.
So it's possible, and I'd even say probable that the 'welfare standards' could be higher elsewhere.
It could be easily marketed as such to your peril. Remember the successful Anchor butter ads when they were showing NZ idyllic countryside?
So you may not have the trump marketing card you think and your 'sub' for the 'high standards' you keep mentioning would be payment for a myth.

Your assumptions are not correct.
The UK is not wealthy, its up to the neck in debt.
Food imports have to be paid with hard currency, not printed money.

 

[Kiwi Pete]

Exactly so ur admitting there was huge scope to improve, most of the farmers in Scotland are achieving respectable performance across their farms already low prices have forced them to be more efficient to survive so theres not much scope in which to bridge the gap if subs are removed, farm debt is at record levels with rising costs and poor prices theres no next you need a reality check when comparing the two

I thought you were comparing the two..
Isn't the OP about France considering repeating the mistakes made by NZ in the mid 70s?
What I'm actually suggesting is, there was a huge need to improve. We went from meat and wool being on a high, to high subs for a decade, then none of either.

But you do bring about a good point, as you furiously bash your keyboard - since sheep farmers have it all so right now, why do they need a set minimum price for their sales?

If it's so easy here @Bossfarmer, come and buy a big dairy farm and see how you go,
easiest money there is. Bring all your toys over in containers and have a crack.
Bring sunscreen.

 

[kiwi pom]

if you produce the same as everyone else you get world prices

we dont, we produce food to a higher standard and live in a country where the consumers are very wealthy and can afford to pay more for this quality product, the climate means its more expensive to produce food so it should be reflected in what the farmers gets paid, we as farmers cant afford to embark on big marketing campaigns which of course would never compete with the power of the supermarkets so why suggest it?

You don't produce higher standard food than the rest of the world though, some countries yes and maybe you have a few more rules but that doesn't mean your food is better, so if the consumer can get it cheaper else where why shouldn't they?
Your whole argument is you're a farmer and the world needs food so you should be guaranteed a sustainable income. Sorry no one else gets that why should you?
Do you always buy Scottish or British if there's a better cheaper option out there?
Have you any experience of agriculture outside of Scotland?

 

[ollie989898]

Product sold at cost of production plus?

Whose cost of production?

I know people who can produce milk for 19ppl all in. They will obviously coin it if the baseline price is set on someone who can't make it for less than 28ppl??

In many sectors there is a huge gulf between the best and worst performers. As such, any system based on COP+ is doomed to fail and will not remove any inherent inequality from any sector. The people who are already sh!t hot will be able to pay £200 for land to rent?

 

[ollie989898]

Your assumptions are not correct.
The UK is not wealthy, its up to the neck in debt.
Food imports have to be paid with hard currency, not printed money.

Most countries are in debt. It makes the world go around.

 

[glasshouse]

Most countries are in debt. It makes the world go around.

Not to the level of debt the uk has.
Our grandchildren will still be paying it.

 

[glasshouse]

Product sold at cost of production plus?

Whose cost of production?

I know people who can produce milk for 19ppl all in. They will obviously coin it if the baseline price is set on someone who can't make it for less than 28ppl??

In many sectors there is a huge gulf between the best and worst performers. As such, any system based on COP+ is doomed to fail and will not remove any inherent inequality from any sector. The people who are already sh!t hot will be able to pay £200 for land to rent?

Removing inequality is not the aim.
That is impossible.
The aim is to maintain production at home, as operated from 1940 to 1980.
Some farms will always have high cop because of geographical factors outwith farmers control.
If everyone is kept producing, the £200 bid for rent will remain just a bid.

 

[Bossfarmer]

Product sold at cost of production plus?

Whose cost of production?

I know people who can produce milk for 19ppl all in. They will obviously coin it if the baseline price is set on someone who can't make it for less than 28ppl??

In many sectors there is a huge gulf between the best and worst performers. As such, any system based on COP+ is doomed to fail and will not remove any inherent inequality from any sector. The people who are already sh!t hot will be able to pay £200 for land to rent?

take the benchmarking average

 

[Bossfarmer]

You don't produce higher standard food than the rest of the world though, some countries yes and maybe you have a few more rules but that doesn't mean your food is better, so if the consumer can get it cheaper else where why shouldn't they?
Your whole argument is you're a farmer and the world needs food so you should be guaranteed a sustainable income. Sorry no one else gets that why should you?
Do you always buy Scottish or British if there's a better cheaper option out there?
Have you any experience of agriculture outside of Scotland?

yes we do its all traceable and tested, other countries are feeding allsorts and injecting hormones

 

[Bossfarmer]

Hi @Bossfarmer,
I'm really not sure if you are taking the Mick here or not.
It is a very simple fact that food will always be available in the UK because it is a wealthy country and it's good citizens, employed or not, will all earn enough personally or via the state, to be able to afford something to eat. Yes I know about food banks etc, but the bottom line is it's hardly sub Sarah Africa poverty here due to lack of food production. It's social allocation politics.
You can very often import food items cheaper than they can be produced for in the U.K. It's a climate and space thing. If you have a good climate, say for cattle, and lots of space to keep them, the inputs are less, so too then is the COP. I could make the same argument for lamb, veg, cereals etc.
Don't let this confuse you that the 'standards' aren't as high just because COP is lower. Indeed, the free roaming, grass fed, never housed, and barely interfered with beast from the pampas, veldt, plains and outback may have a significantly better life than the cattle in the north of Scotland. If I was a cow, I know where I'd want to live.
So it's possible, and I'd even say probable that the 'welfare standards' could be higher elsewhere.
It could be easily marketed as such to your peril. Remember the successful Anchor butter ads when they were showing NZ idyllic countryside?
So you may not have the trump marketing card you think and your 'sub' for the 'high standards' you keep mentioning would be payment for a myth.

you are very much mistaken we have a massively populated island and only enough food to last us a few months in any time of a global shortage/war you will have supermarket shelves run bare VERY quickly and mass panic buying it will be like people queing at the pumps when the fuel shortage was announced a few years back

 

[Doc]

Yes, small island, loads of folk. But nothing like Asia. They can really pack them in there.
Doesn't really matter.
Politics, Production, Logistics and transport have changed out of all recognition since WW2, which is the basis of a lot of 'food security' thinking.
Who are you protecting us all from?

 

[Agrispeed]

yes we do its all traceable and tested, other countries are feeding allsorts

Food traceability scandals?

That would never happen in the UK...

Anyone for lasagne?

 

[Doc]

I actually thought the Burgers at Burger King were better when Silvercrest were supplying the 'beef'.
Gone downhill since.

 

[glasshouse]

Yes, small island, loads of folk. But nothing like Asia. They can really pack them in there.
Doesn't really matter.
Politics, Production, Logistics and transport have changed out of all recognition since WW2, which is the basis of a lot of 'food security' thinking.
Who are you protecting us all from?

that makes it worse.
far less kept in store now, so if disaster hits, big problem

 

[Tom_o_m]

I wonder how this applies to agricultural products from outside france but within the single market (including us, for now)? Surely they can't discriminate

 

[milkloss]

you are very much mistaken we have a massively populated island and only enough food to last us a few months in any time of a global shortage/war you will have supermarket shelves run bare VERY quickly and mass panic buying it will be like people queing at the pumps when the fuel shortage was announced a few years back

. If you think anything to do with subs in the uk is about keeping food on the shelves I think you've got something very wrong there. what times of strife will hit us that cause food shortages? There's £13 billion worth of food a year chucked away in the uk alone, if that was used more efficiently it would put a big hole in your shortages.

 

[Bossfarmer]

Yes, small island, loads of folk. But nothing like Asia. They can really pack them in there.
Doesn't really matter.
Politics, Production, Logistics and transport have changed out of all recognition since WW2, which is the basis of a lot of 'food security' thinking.
Who are you protecting us all from?

other countries extorting us

 

[Bossfarmer]

. If you think anything to do with subs in the uk is about keeping food on the shelves I think you've got something very wrong there. what times of strife will hit us that cause food shortages? There's £13 billion worth of food a year chucked away in the uk alone, if that was used more efficiently it would put a big hole in your shortages.

any disease epidemic or fall ot with EU countries after brexit could impact food security not to mention tensions between USA, Russia and NK, its chucked away for a reason and thats not a huge amount for the poplation