Shropshire Farming Talk: Farming misconceptions
I was at a meeting recently when people were complaining, among other things, about the tractors on roads and lanes where they live. Contrary to what I may say here, farmers don’t want sympathy and they don’t want to feel they whinge all the time.
But here I am, saying things that make you think they do.
I heard all the usual things.
“They’re driving past our house at all times of the day and night.” Well, that means they’re working, while you’re sitting in front of the TV or just chilling.
“They drive along public roads holding up the traffic when you’re busy going somewhere.” They are actually going somewhere too – to work.
“They block the lanes with their massive machines.” Would you prefer a horse and cart?
“The machines are noisy and dirty.” Well, aren’t you glad you don’t have to work with them?
Sound ridiculous, doesn’t it? And all this about the people who are providing your food.
I loved being a farmer and wish I still was one. But in the real world I’m too old and we were tenants, so retirement meant we had to leave as our children said they wouldn’t work seven days a week and 365 days a year to be that poor. Which is fair enough if you don’t love it.
But the worst things are the pressures. The paperwork, the compliance rules, the social stigma of how cruel it is to be killing animals and ruining the countryside and world. All to provide food for you to eat.
Most people have lost that connection with the countryside that they had when they had someone in their family to visit.
Nobody keeps a pig in their backyard, like my grandfather did, and killed it. That’s a bit extreme I know, but when we first started we owned a few acres, which was a lifestyle financed by my husband’s lecturing job, although it had to pay for itself.
We would perhaps have three or four lambs ready to go at once, and we’d put them in the back of our estate car and take them to the butcher who had his own little “facility” behind his shop.
Unbelievable now, with animal welfare and health and safety – and, of course, small abattoirs like this no longer exist.
It’s progress. People like their meat neatly wrapped, ready to cook without having to handle the funny bits, and in the same place as their vegetables and milk and bread and beer. Thanks to supermarkets for this, which make life so much easier and cheaper than the old way, thanks to subsidies.
So big lorries on roads taking food to cities and loading potatoes and wheat to go to factories are just what the people at the meeting don’t want. But they want the convenience.
Rosemary Allen is a retired livestock farmer who lives near Ellesmere
