What does the future hold for us farmers?

Depending on who you talk to we are either in exciting or concerning times.

So as far as the grain markets are concerned, what does the future hold for us?

Well I suspect that if I knew the answer to that I would be writing this from my beachside villa somewhere in the Caribbean. So what can we expect?

For the past few years we have seen volatility brought on mainly by weather events affecting the markets, but last year we enjoyed the added ingredient of politics and politicians – this made the market head upwards in this country due to our currency going down.

That is marvellous I hear you say, which it is, but please remember the old adage "that what goes up, will come down".

So why could that happen or what would make that happen? The perceived wisdom is that maybe the pound was too high before the Brexit vote and this has seen a readjustment. Some would say that the UK since the Brexit vote is a basket case and that is why the currency is low and maybe it should be lower.

But what if all of a sudden Mrs May makes a speech that does start to set the foundations for our exit from the EU and the markets take a liking to the idea?

The pound goes up, grain goes down. There have been beneficial rains in South America and world stocks are reasonably high and so what I am trying to say is that with current new crop wheat prices in the early £130s is this worth a hedge with a few tonnes?

Looking a bit further forward to post 2020 there seems to be a lot of discussion in the media regarding subsidy support after that date. I wonder what the effect would be of a complete withdrawal or a much-reduced subsidy payment?

Would land prices fall? Would rents come down? All answers to dwlr@godavies.co.uk

There is one thing for sure, we are all in this together and whichever way we voted we now must all work together. A happy, healthy and prosperous (hopefully) New Year to you all.

* David Roberts is managing director of G.O Davies (Westbury) Ltd, a privately owned grain merchant operating across Wales and the West Midlands.