Wales Farm Business Grants....

Dr Evil

Member
Location
Ceredigion
And I cant see them giving much discount when they have a full order book. The price can only go up.

What effect will a fluctuating £:$ or £:€ have on these average prices? "Sorry Mrs Claimant, sterling has crashed, so the price of our widget has gone through the roof- plus every man an his dog wants one so we can't make them quick enough"

On the surface, looks a decent scheme to me though- but there'll be a crazy rush now, as it's years since there's been anything meaningful like this in Wales.
 

Penmoel

Member
£6m of the £40m available in the first of the three application periods for 17/18 could well be worth waiting for later application periods???
 

GTB

Never Forgotten
Honorary Member
Nfu Cymru (and others) had put enormous pressure on the ag minister to bring out a simple scheme where no consultants were needed, i.e. No business plan needed and a simple application form that farmers could fill in without professional help. To be fair to Leslie Griffiths, she and her department have taken this on board and delivered exactly that.

It's a shame therefore that FC have, after being awarded the contract to manage the claim process, decided to milk it as much as they can. The meeting at Aber was blatant propoganda for themselves and the various conultancies. I don't think making farmers attend a meeting because they couldn't claim the grant otherwise is the way to go. Neither is talking to them like a bunch of schoolchildren. It was very apt I thought that the meeting in Aber was held in a school.

I have nothing against using a consultant if necessary and am quite capable of contacting one and arranging the 80% grant (and have done so in the past) without having it shoved in my face by FC thank you very much.
 
I've no problem with coming clean, a lot of people on here already know that my wife is one of CARA's directors.
CARA were asked to be involved in these events, and I can assure you are not making a profit out of it!
Would you rather Farming Connect used the ADAS's of this world or a small welsh company, employing staff who all live in wales which keeps FC money circulating in the local economy.
Would you now like to declare an interest in family members benefiting from Farming Connect money?
 

neilo

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Montgomeryshire
Nfu Cymru (and others) had put enormous pressure on the ag minister to bring out a simple scheme where no consultants were needed, i.e. No business plan needed and a simple application form that farmers could fill in without professional help. To be fair to Leslie Griffiths, she and her department have taken this on board and delivered exactly that.

It's a shame therefore that FC have, after being awarded the contract to manage the claim process, decided to milk it as much as they can. The meeting at Aber was blatant propoganda for themselves and the various conultancies. I don't think making farmers attend a meeting because they couldn't claim the grant otherwise is the way to go. Neither is talking to them like a bunch of schoolchildren. It was very apt I thought that the meeting in Aber was held in a school.

I have nothing against using a consultant if necessary and am quite capable of contacting one and arranging the 80% grant (and have done so in the past) without having it shoved in my face by FC thank you very much.

Now that's something I do have an issue with, and again is down to FC's management of the scheme. I wanted to get 80% funding on some soil testing & recs. To qualify, they wanted me to pay ADAS (other parasites are available) to do a farm business plan. I suggested that I was quite capable of doing that, then they said I could only do that if I attended one of their sessions on how to do so. Eventually, I managed to get away with a 1 hour telephone 'consultation', for which an expert was being paid handsomely from a our modulated funds, and she filed a report and ticked a box to recommend that I could get what I had wanted all along. The consultation was basically a chat where I explained why I wanted to do some soil testing, and why I thought it was important that I did some soil testing.
It all drew money from our modulated pot, and the complications are barriers to those in Welsh Agriculture who would most benefit from the funding and advice.

I've gone off on a tangent now, other than FC seems to have a very good system for looking after those experts on their preferred list, and the management does't seem to prioritise getting aid and advice to those that could get most use from it.

Anyway, back to the gravy train in question.....
 
Last edited:

Penmoel

Member
No problem I don't hide my identity , yes my eldest daughter works at FC, just like many other farmers daughters.

Come clean, yes!
WAG have stolen, taken,removed ,money from the direct support Pillar 1, remember 15% max modulation!!! and put it in Pillar 2 in order to help fill their socialist dream of new job creation schemes. They saw a pot of money and wanted a share of it for their pet projects across Wales.

And don't even start me on where our HLCA money in Wales has gone , what was it about £25m a year which darling Elin Jones said we could not continue with in Wales as it was against WTO rules. What did she do took the money and gave us bl**dy Glastir.

No other state or devolved govt has done away with HLCA payments

I agree farmers daughters working for the quango, or even CARA, is one way of some of this money coming back to the rural community. How sustainable is this after Brexit is yet to be seen?

CARA I am afraid are the same as all the other consultants, it is a growth industry created on the back of the socialist dream as is FC. I have not hidden my views on this

Roughly how much has been creamed off???

Last figure I had heard was nearly £900m, yet we as farmers should be happy to be thrown less than 5% of this over the next 4 years.

Get me the figure which shows what proportion of the budget will go in administration, how many bods sat in the front row and elsewhere the other night were on attendance fees or hourly rates?
 
Last edited:

GTB

Never Forgotten
Honorary Member
Far far too many quangos consultants and advisors living off the backs of farmers.
Many folk have been ripped off with farm appraisals and business plans.
Only to be told what they already knew[emoji849][emoji33]
Agree. But it's also good to get someone from the outside to look at your business sometimes, even if it only confirms what you already knew. Sometimes we're just to close to something to see it.
 

neilo

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Montgomeryshire
Think I may have found some of your HLCA/Tir Mynydd money- was it used to buy a now bankrupt Motorbike manufacturer in Buckinghamshire?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-39706499



Well- Ebbw Vale is rural, and the common is LFA- sounds a worthy recipient of WG money. £9.3m of it...

And lots used to purchase 'supplies', mostly from companies with the same shareholders as the Heads of the Valleys group that received the funding, allegedly. If it was Italy, you would almost expect it......
 

Penmoel

Member
Dream up a big enough scheme ,promise a few hundred service industry jobs. Oh we need £9m or £ 10m for feasibility study planning etc and then a couple of hundred million more .........

As neil says you would think they are talking Italian lire
 

Recoil

Member
Location
South East Wales
We went to the meeting last night in Abergavenny. One thing I think that's disappointing is having the lower limit of a claim set at £3000. It makes it difficult for us as young farmers just setting up in sheep to get involved. I would quite like an eid reader, but that doesn't meet the lower claim limit. We would need to spend £7.5k to qualify. This is money we simply don't have.

Having said that, I think it's the best scheme they have come up with for a while and would be good if you had the money to get involved.

I think the list of items is quite a good one, but wonder why there is no inclusion of some sheds such as a fairly standard 60x40 one. Surely nearly every farmer could do with an extra shed.
 

GTB

Never Forgotten
Honorary Member
Someone was complaining in the Aber meeting that the minimum was too high as he only wanted to buy some bunded fuel tanks. And he was no new entrant. :rolleyes:

Fair point though @Recoil it is very hard to find the other 60% for well established businesses leave alone new entrants.
 

sleepy

Member
Location
Devon, UK
Will these grants actually end up saving farmers any money at all?

How many people will buy something they don't really need just because they can get a 40% grant on it.

How many things will suddenly become 40% more expensive overnight when they hear you are from Wales?

I guess it helps keep the money going round.

Anyone want to put in a claim for me? I could do with a grassland subsoiler, I'm happy with a 35% grant you can keep 5% as commission
 

SFI - What % were you taking out of production?

  • 0 %

    Votes: 81 42.2%
  • Up to 25%

    Votes: 68 35.4%
  • 25-50%

    Votes: 30 15.6%
  • 50-75%

    Votes: 3 1.6%
  • 75-100%

    Votes: 3 1.6%
  • 100% I’ve had enough of farming!

    Votes: 7 3.6%

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

  • 1,294
  • 1
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/
Top