FARMERMAY 2009
IN BRIEF
News and advice from the
riding world starts on p19
CUMBRIA HORSE
A model farm
SCHOOSE Farm was built as a
pioneering
model farm in
the 18th
century by John
Christian
Curwen, a
cousin of
famous Bounty
mutineer
Fletcher
Christian, just
as the
agricultural revolution was
gathering steam.
He is believed to have been
the first farmer to use crop
rotation in Cumbria and to
employ women on an equal
footing with men.
Now, his farm is getting a
massive injection of Defra cash
in the biggest project of its
kind to date in England.
Full story � centre pages
Brussels lowdown
CUMBRIA Federation of Young
Farmers chairman Jim Nicholson
accompanied 22
farmers from
the north west
on a fact-
finding trip to
Brussels last
month.
The 27-year-
old sheep and
beef farmer
talks about his
impressions of the European
decision-making process and
comes to the conclusion that
being in Europe is a good thing
for British farmers.
Full story � page 5
It's a war zone!
"I'M about to enter what I can
only describe as an emergency
maternity ward in a war zone.
Only it's baby
lambs that are
being born,
and at the rate
of 10 to 20 a
day."
Last month,
Sara Conkey, a
BBC Radio 4
producer
based in
Birmingham,
deserted her desk and did a
36-hour shift on Anthorn Farm
at the peak of the lambing
season.
Read the full account of her
time on the farm on p4
John Bowe:
Current owner
Encouraged:
Jim Nicholson
Role: Sara, right,
at Anthorn Farm
EU says direct aid to
continue after 2013
EXCLUSIVE BY ANNA BURDETT
Farming and Rural Affairs Editor
A
ny attempts by the UK
government to wrest
control of farm support
payments post-2013
must be resisted, according to
the EU's agriculture commis-
sioner.
In an exclusive interview with
Cumbria Farmer, Mariann Fisch-
er Boel, Europe's agriculture and
rural development commissioner,
was adamant that individual gov-
ernments must not take control
when the current Common Agri-
cultural Policy budget ends in
2013.
She said: "We need to maintain
a common policy, and resist all
attempts to renationalise agricul-
tural support.
"I want to see a bigger role for
rural development policy. We need
as much market orientation as
possible, but we need to maintain
a modern type of safety net for
times of real crisis.
"We also need to continue pay-
ing direct aid to farmers, but this
will have to be much more care-
fully targeted and more closely
linked to the provision of public
goods such as the protection of the
environment and animal welfare."
Talks on the future of support
payments between the 27 member
states in Europe have already
started.
In the current economic crisis,
member governments will be
keener than ever to try and claw
back some of the CAP money to
their domestic budgets.
Many farmers fear that direct
payments will be stopped after
2013, but Ms Fischer Boel has
given the clearest indication yet
that this form of aid will continue.
She also said that the British
government would still have room
to manoeuvre in deciding how
rural development money, such as
payments for voluntary set-aside,
might be used.
She added: "The maintenance of
a voluntary set-aside scheme was
a major issue for the UK in last
year's CAP Health Check discus-
sions.
"They won the right to use
rural development money to pre-
serve important habitats.
"This fits very well with our
overall aim in the Health Check to
transfer some money from direct
payments into rural development
to deal with new challenges farm-
ers face, such as climate change
mitigation and the protection of
bio-diversity.
"So yes, there is a future for this
measure, and it's up to the British
to decide how to manage it."
National governments were
given control over how to spend
more than one billion Euros
recently earmarked for Europe's
rural regions in the European
Economic Recovery Package.
The money could be used to
help struggling dairy farmers
weather the current crisis of low
milk prices.
"Again, it is a matter for the
British government to decide how
they want to spend this money,"
she said.
While the same agricultural
policy will continue to apply to
all, individual governments are
likely to have greater autonomy
over detailed spending post-2013.
Recent changes to the CAP have
made it possible to use the money
to help set up insurance pro-
grammes and mutual funds.
This might be used to help
farmers meet the costs of the UK
government's proposed animal
disease levy.
Ms Fischer Boel is in talks with
the government over TB eradica-
tion in the UK.
She said: "The UK has recently
submitted a programme for its
eradication with a view to obtain-
ing possible co-funding from the
commission for 2010.
"This programme will be anal-
ysed in the coming weeks before a
decision is taken in the autumn.
"The commission will hold fur-
ther discussions with the UK in
the near future, accompanied by
the TB eradication task force, to
review and, if necessary,
strengthen the submitted
eradication programme."
Cumbrian farmers visit
Brussels � pages 4 & 5
Commissioner is also adamant that UK will not
be allowed to wrest control of support payments
Mariann Fischer Boel: 'We need to maintain a common policy, and resist all attempts to renationalise agricultural support'
`We need to continue paying direct
aid to farmers, but this will have to
be much more carefully targeted
and more closely linked to the
provision of public goods such as
the protection of the environment'

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