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April-08-05 - Gareth Jones

We are farming 2,300 acres (950 hectares) in hand  1.5 miles west of Corwen. The whole farm was converted to Organic production in October 2000. The stock comprise of one hundred Aberdeen Angus cows, that are kept pure, with 200 organic store cattle purchased annually. The sheep enterprise consists of 3,300 breeding ewes kept in three separate flocks. Around 300 Norfolk Bronze Turkeys are finished for the Christmas market. Cropping consists of  around 200 acres of Triticale and Oats that are produced mainly for feeding our own livestock. The whole idea of the farming system is that it is sustainable long term so that we grow the feed to supplement our livestock, which in turn produce the manure to fertilise the land to grow the crops. In other words ‘closing the circle’, so that we try not to rely on imported inputs.

All the livestock that we produce are finished on the farm and are sold either through our own farm shop, to the Waitrose supermarket and all over the country by mail order.

The last couple of months have been quite hectic on the farm, as one would expect of a livestock farm in spring – lambing has been in progress for the past three weeks or more and on the whole has been successful. We have had just over thirty calves which is approaching half way. The Easter period was spent sowing Triticlae and Oats which will be combined in August/September. We are currently spreading muck and ploughing for the Arable silage (a mixture of Oats, Peas and Vetches) and reseeding, which will be silaged during early August.

As we eagerly await our Single Farm Payment form we have a chance to think of the changes that we all face within the industry and try to predict the implications for us all. One concern is that suckler cow numbers will decrease, consequently there will be fewer store cattle available. The prices that store cattle have been commanding at the moment would suggest that there will be little, or in fact no margin in these when they are finished.

Having spent a couple of periods in New Zealand, one in the early eighties (when they were paid subsidies) and the other in 2000, the changes that they have gone through are immense, and they have emerged as a much leaner and fitter industry very much focused and geared towards their end market, be it Europe, Asia or America. As a consequence I would urge our industry leaders to unite us all as one with a strong eye on our market and farm accordingly and not farm the subsidies as we have done over the past three or four decades.

Written By: Gareth Jones

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