Careers in Farming

[Dan Salter]

Sorry im trying to stick to the rule of naming posts sensibly but struggled with that one.

Anyway...im reading my excellent issue 1 of Cav's Countryfile magazine today and spotted this that made me chuckle (although i sympathise with the problem)

Page 14 and 15 (double spread .."Country News")

"News in Numbers" ( middle of spread )
55..The Average age of farmers in the UK. To address this concern, the NFU is launching a new campaign called Life on the Land to encourage fresh blood into agriculture. For more info www.nfuonline.com"

"Worse Health" (bottom left hand corner of spread)
Farmers have worse health, suffer greater stress and endure poorer quality of life than workers in any other sector, according to the British Medical Journal. The higher risk of accidents, burden of red tape and concerns over the future have left farmers feeling increasingly disheartned"

So theres your answer right there! Maybe the NFU and the British Medical Journal should talk?

Dan

[Dan Salter]

Ok so i guess it was only me that found this interesting ha ha.

[naturelover]

no i do too,there telling the youngsters ( dont do this job its not good ) or you could die,ha ha stupid idiots.

[Billy Wobble Dagger]

I really can't imagine any one wanting to be a farmer any more. A hard life at the best of times, but the last few years have been a nightmare for them.
I think it's probably time to re-invent the wheel as far as farming is concerned and get back to growing for local communities.
But thats another thread all together.

BWD

[cavscott]

And then there's the fact that, say in pig farming, a farmer can be looking at £35 loss on every single pig sold.

And they're looking at blue-tongue surviving the winter, which as some farmers have been telling me is far scarier than FMD.

And rising feed prices. And loss of crops due to the floods (eg. 50% of pea harvest destroyed.

It's a scary time for farmers.

[Fourwings]

I had worked in Agriculture for over 25 years until March of this year, for much of this time I was managing a dairy herd.
British agriculture is in a very dark place at the moment, with mounting pressure from european red tape, money grabbing supermarkets, disease outbreaks etc.......
All I can say to people is to try and support British farmers/produce where at all possible, our meat and dairy products are still the best, should agriculture in this country totally collapse then we will be left to the mercy of our less quality aware european neighbours, paying inflated prices for imported food that quite frankly I wouldn't feed to my dog!!