Growing in wisdom

Date: 17/10/1996

FOR the past 50 years, we have given our farmers a remarkably narrow set of goals and accompanying incentives to help achieve them.

These have included economic performance without environmental accountability; maximum production without consideration of food quality and health; intensification without regard for animal welfare; and specialisation without consideration for the maintenance of biological and cultural diversity.

The signals we sent said what we wanted - cheap food and plenty of it. We can hardly blame our farmers now for their outstanding success in achieving those goals.

But if we want to modify and add to those goals in the light of experience and changing public expectations, we are only going to be able to do so with the support of a further reformed Common Agricultural Policy.

Historically, vast amounts of money have gone into the CAP. Unfortunately, the expenditure of it has not been modified sufficiently to keep pace with the many changes in technology, environmental impact and social concerns that have taken place in recent years.

For instance, in 1995 only 2&percent; of total CAP expenditure went to supporting agri-environment schemes, despite the fact that surveys show that most consumers would now put 'green' farming right at the top of their priority list for CAP support.

Such schemes do, of course, assist in various ways, but the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds' calculation that only one arable acre in every hundred is eligible for such schemes helps to put things into perspective.

Some farmers have even managed to use set-aside and arable area payments constructively on the road to organic production and I know that the UK's Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food has encouraged this. But the total acreage utilised in this way has also been tiny.

We should not forget that many management practices and cropping regimes which are undertaken by 'conventional' farmers can have considerable benefits for landscape and wildlife.

But the rate of policy reforms towards actually encouraging such things is desperately slow. Initiatives which encourage more extensive and mixed arable cropping, currently being promoted by a number of leading conservation agencies to address the appalling decline in once common and much-loved farmland birds, simply have to be taken seriously.

One of the particular problems with existing CAP payments is that they are still generally of greatest benefit to those intensive farms which have either a high proportion of arable land or high densities of livestock. The traditionally-managed mixed and extensive farms, which provide so many benefits, do less well, particularly where set-aside and arable area payments are concerned.

I suspect that most farmers receiving these payments know, in the privacy of their own minds, that this is 'money for old rope' and of little real value to the taxpayer.

They also know that sooner or later this situation will end, and some may feel better when it does. One or two have even said so in public.

But what happens then?

There are some people (notably the free marketeers who are wholly in favour of GATT and the further globalisation of trade in agricultural products) who would prefer to see the CAP abolished altogether.

For this group, farming has no special claim to be treated any differently from the steel and mining industries.

But they are still, thank goodness, outnumbered by those who recognise that agriculture is unique, with responsibility not only for feeding us, but also for custody of a precious natural resource, as well as cultural and social dimensions that cannot be ignored.

Farmers play a crucial role, not only in safeguarding the health of the nation and the environment, but also in maintaining the vitality and viability of our rural communities.

Few would dispute the need to encourage farmers to become more responsive to their markets, but if we want them to adopt more environmentally-sustainable methods, it is clear we could use the mechanisms of the CAP to encourage moves in this direction, together with training, just as we used them in the past to encourage maximum production.

There are always going to be aspects of farming, such as maintaining the fabric of our landscape, where the costs cannot easily be passed on to the consumer. It is difficult to ignore evidence such as the recent Gallup poll which showed that 'the countryside' came second only to 'free speech' as the attribute most valued in Britain today.

Yet it is impossible, and counter-productive, to attempt to attach a monetary value to such intangible aspects of our existence. So we need to find new ways in which all farmers can be supported for providing these services to society as a whole.

There seems to be a growing consensus that the best way would be to make specific payments to farmers who commit the whole of their farms to environmentally-sound methods, and to ensuring food safety, nutritional quality and animal welfare.

This might form the heart of a future CAP. But I suspect it will only come about if we can get away from the idea that CAP reform is all a matter of negotiation and look to develop a common purpose on issues such as the environment, rural development and food quality in a much more active way than at present.

Of course, the prevailing 'expert' and 'official' wisdom about CAP reform in the UK has been that while we might like to replace the existing outdated subsidy mechanisms, other European countries would fight tooth and nail to retain the status quo.

The line has been that 'mainland Europeans like things too much as they are, and they certainly do not all share our interest in the environment'.

Well, I have done some testing of my own on this, at two seminars held at Sandringham with the help of the Agricultural Reform Group, and my impression is that there may be a good deal more ground for consensus than is often suggested.

We found that mainstream European farmers shared many of the views of their supposedly more enlightened British counterparts.

This consensus is set to be tested further at a conference of farmers and environmentalists entitled The Ground

We Share in Brussels later this month.

I do not believe that anything quite like this has ever been tried before, and I am simply delighted that the European Commissioners for agriculture and the environment are scheduled to speak. It could be quite interesting.

At a practical, measurable level, I was fascinated to see a recent study of the extent of organic farming in Europe. Under exactly the same CAP regulatory regime, there are wide differences in how much has been achieved.

Several countries, including Sweden, Denmark and Germany, expect to have at least 10&percent; of their land area in organic farming by the year 2000. They have recognised that organic farming delivers an impressive range of environmental and social benefits, which are worth the cost of assisting farmers during the transition period.

I happen to believe that agriculture is important as one of the foundation stones of a sustainable cultural life. A society will, in some ways, model itself on the food it grows.

If the way in which people farm is grasping, looks only to the short term and is indifferent to the effects of what is being done on the generations that will follow, then that is what our society will be like too.

But if there is a symbiotic relationship, as much about cooperation as dominance, gratitude as much as self-congratulation, as much about giving back as taking out, then that, I believe, will be a powerful shaping force in the lives we lead.

The threat posed by the industrialisation of agriculture to our quality of life is the real reason why we need to care passionately about the future of farming.

Our aim should be nothing less than to restore agriculture to its rightful place as one of the greatest and most important of all the enterprises in which human beings are engaged.

This article is based on extracts from a speech made by HRH The Prince of Wales to the UK Soil Association last month, reproduced with the kind permission of St James' Palace. Prince Charles will be in Brussels for a conference organised by the Agricultural Reform Group from 29 to 31 October.