It was after Laurence Candy lost most of his dairy herd to bovine tuberculosis that he decided he would no longer send animals to the slaughterhouse.

“It made me wonder if we can justify the industrial slaughter of sentient beings,” says the 50-year-old looking back on the event in 2017. “As a society, we have to question this.”

Since last year, Mr Candy has been working with a Scottish-based organisation called Farmers For Stock-Free Farming (FFSFF), which has been set up to support meat and dairy farmers who want to transition to animal-free agriculture.

He is now in the process of selling his remaining animals – 35 beef cattle – and concentrating instead on growing cereals such as oat, wheat, barley and broad beans.

Mr Candy is also switching to “veganic production”, which prohibits the use of manure, or any other animal product, to improve the soil. For this, he is working with a body called International Biocyclic Vegan Network, which promotes and certifies plant-based, organic farms around the world.

“It allows for two years to transition out of a livestock enterprise and establish suitable alternatives,” he says. “This approach enables the farmer to have a suitable timescale to develop their business plans, without a financial impact.”

Mr Candy adds: “I’m trying to add value. There’s currently very few farmers growing veganically, but obviously veganism is a growing trend in his country.”

Letting small family farms go to the wall will “break the backbone of Britain’s rural communities”, Prince Charles has said.

The focus on producing plentiful and cheap food threatens the survival of the country’s smaller farms, he says.

If they go it will “rip the heart out of the British countryside”, he warns.

The government says it wants to support all farmers and “the choices that they take on their own holdings”.

It comes ahead of the publication of the National Food Strategy, the first major review of Britain’s food system in more than 70 years.

The strategy was commissioned by the government and is headed by Henry Dimbleby, the founder of the Leon restaurant chain.

Thursday’s report will explore the links between food production and environmental degradation including climate change, biodiversity loss, pollution and the sustainable use of resources.

It will include recommendations for the government, which has promised to respond with a White Paper within six months.

The first part of the strategy was published in July last year and highlighted the connection between obesity, poverty and the UK’s high Covid-19 death toll.

The Prince of Wales has been concerned with food and the environment for most of his adult life.

His latest intervention comes in the form of an essay for Radio 4’s Today programme.

In it, he condemns the super-efficient intensive agricultural system that produces much of the food we eat as a “dead end”.

The so-called “green Brexit” promised by the government has not been delivered, a coalition of environment groups says.

In 2017, the Environment Secretary Michael Gove promised: “Leaving the EU gives a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to reform agriculture and fisheries.”

That, he said, would allow the UK to reshape the way it cares for its land, its rivers and its seas.

“In short,” Mr Gove pledged, “it means a Green Brexit.”

Over four years and 11 reports, an environmental coalition called Greener UK has tracked policies – and concluded that improvement across the board has not been realised.

Environment Secretary George Eustice said Brexit enabled the UK to create “world-leading legislation, delivering better environmental outcomes in an effective and efficient way”.

Farmers in Wensleydale are looking at whether they can deliver better outcomes for our environment when given greater flexibility and autonomy to manage their land. While the farmers and land managers of Barningham Estate Farmers Group are exploring ways to encourage farmers to work together across diverse landscapes to achieve their environmental goals.

By testing and trialling elements of the new scheme, Defra is looking to work together with farmers and land managers to harness their ideas, gain their feedback and build something that works for the diverse needs of the agriculture sector, whilst also improving our environment.

This comes ahead of the landmark Agriculture Bill returning to Parliament next week. The Bill sets out our ambitions to transform British farming by delivering the new ELM scheme, which will reward farmers for public goods they produce, such as providing habitats for wildlife and improving air and water quality. Importantly, the Bill will also help farmers take full advantage of the opportunities available to them as we leave the outdated Common Agricultural Policy.

The U.K. organization for farmers, landowners and businesses in rural England and Wales has said labor shortages caused by coronavirus could be devastating for this years’ harvest. They are calling for a ‘land army’ of local labour to be recruited to assist the sector, which expects to see its labour supply cut by 75% as EU workers who normally come to the U.K. to work for the harvest season are prevented from coming.

The U.K. agriculture sector was already in trouble, heavily reliant on EU workers as it is. Since the Brexit referendum in 2016, when the U.K. voted to leave the European Union, labour supply from the mainland has been dwindling, and the government’s recent immigration stance emphasizing high-skilled migration has provided little comfort.

Now, thanks to coronavirus, we are seeing what happens when borders are totally closed to foreign workers, at least for one sector. According to the CLA, the agriculture sector usually uses around 60,000 seasonal laborers per year to complete the harvest, and they expect only around 25% of that amount this year. Factor in a 20% coronavirus infection rate the CLA is reckoning with, and they estimate some 80,000 people will need to be mobilized to protect Britain’s harvest.

Farming leaders have raised concerns about a lack of available labour because of the coronavirus, with one calling for a “land army” to be recruited from people put out of work by the crisis.

Restrictions in place because of the virus are likely to prevent many of the 60,000 seasonal labourers who come to the UK each year to work on farms from travelling, and the supply of domestic workers is also expected to be reduced.

Farmers in many parts of the country are already struggling after months of severe floods, and the supply of seasonal workers was already in doubt because of Brexit.

The Country Land and Business Association (CLA), which represents more than 30,000 landowners and rural firms, estimates that the shortage of workers could hit 80,000 at a crucial time and leave crops rotting in the fields.

A parliamentary committee in the United Kingdom has put forward an amendment to the Agriculture Bill to protect food standards.

Members of the cross-party Environment Food and Rural Affairs (EFRA) Committee made the move after a hearing with representatives from the agriculture, animal welfare and trade sectors this week.

Members of Parliament (MPs) heard from Emily Rees from Trade Strategies, James West of Compassion in World Farming and Nick von Westenholz from the National Farmers’ Union on how the U.K. can ensure imports under new trade agreements are produced to the animal welfare and environmental standards expected by the public.

The amendment will ensure food imported as part of future trade deals meets or exceeds British standards on production, animal welfare and the environment.

The government has previously said the U.K. will not compromise on its standards of food safety and animal welfare in future trade agreements.

The president of the National Farmers’ Union has hit out at “completely out of touch” suggestions from a senior government adviser that the UK does not need its own agricultural sector.

There were reports that Treasury official Dr Tim Leunig claimed the food sector was not “critically important” to the country’s economy – and that agriculture and fisheries “certainly isn’t”.

In leaked emails published in The Mail on Sunday, the economic adviser to the chancellor Rishi Sunak is reported to have said ministers could follow the example of Singapore, which is “rich without having its own agricultural sector”.

The agriculture and fishing sectors combined represent less than 1 per cent of the UK’s economy. But rural and coastal communities voted out in large numbers during the 2016 referendum after the Vote Leave campaign argued that farmers and fishermen would be better off once free of EU rules.

The government distanced itself from the official’s comments, adding: “We have made it clear the comments are not in line with government policy.”

CAP has a requirement linking farming and social interventions as part of its policy approach, even if in the UK we wilfully dumbed down the social side of things in the last programme by turning LEADER for example into a defacto small grant fund for farmers. 

I think its time for policy makers to wise up and realise that agriculture is about more than soil, science and farming. That’s just a personal and not an official RSN view by the way!!!

This story tells us:

Ministers have accepted that farmers need incentives to farm in a way that leaves a healthy soil for future generations.

Soil protection has become a core issue of the Agriculture Bill that is returning to Parliament.

In its bill the government will promise to reward British farmers who protect the soil.

It is part of a radical shift in the grant system – previously announced – to move subsidies away from EU Common Agricultural Policy which basically pays farmers for owning land.

Instead in post-Brexit Britain they will be rewarded for providing services for society like clean air, clean and plentiful water, flood protection and thriving wildlife.

The grant changes will be phased in over seven years. 

Already there is disquiet from farmers and environmentalists alike that the government has not set in law its promise that UK food standards will not be lowered in any post-Brexit deal with the US.

Minette Batters from the NFU said: “This bill is one of the most significant pieces of legislation for farmers in England for over 70 years.

“However, farmers across the country will still want to see legislation underpinning government assurances that they won’t allow imports of food produced to standards that would be illegal here. 

CPRE, the countryside charity, welcomed what it called a generational opportunity to change the way England farms for the better.

It said: “This bill represents a radical rethink of farming practice and, most importantly, finally starts to recognise the need to regenerate soil – the fundamental building block of our entire agricultural system.”

Although the bill has been applauded, the policies are still in embryonic stage, and as details emerge conflicts are sure to arise.

Ministers must support farmers to become “net zero heroes” and make tackling the climate and nature crises a top agricultural priority, it has been urged.

The call, timed to coincide with farming conferences taking place in Oxford this week, comes as polling suggests nine out of 10 people (92%) think it is important that farmers focus on climate change and wildlife losses.

A survey of 2,140 UK adults by YouGov for the nature and animal welfare coalition Wildlife and Countryside Link suggests only a fifth (22%) think the UK farming sector has reduced its climate impact in the last five years.

Farming

A quarter believe the sector has had a negative impact on climate change while a further 29% believe there has been no change in the past five years.

Environmentalists, farmers and scientists are calling on the Government to put tackling the climate and nature crises at the top of the agenda, and boost support for landowners to deliver wildlife and carbon friendly farming.

The Government has committed to achieve net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, while the National Farmers’ Union has outlined ambitions for the sector to become net zero by 2040.

Soil

They want to see the Agriculture Bill go swiftly through Parliament to deliver payments for public goods such as environment, animal welfare and public access and start the transition to this new system in 2021.

Ministers must also guarantee a budget of at least £3 billion per year for the next 10 years, to be invested in public goods, to give land managers the certainty they need to invest in improving nature and welfare and tackling climate change.

And future trade deals and legislation must maintain or improve environmental and animal welfare requirements, the groups argue.

Richard Benwell, chief executive of Wildlife and Countryside Link, said: “Our climate depends on soil as much as oil.”

Scale

He said the UK could not get to net zero without farmers, with better land management the key to locking up carbon.

“Nine out of ten members of the public want farmers to play their part. So, Government must put the policies in place to help farmers become net zero heroes,” he urged.