Harry's Farm May 2024
Harry metcalfe has a farming diary Youtube show. He provides updates about the growing seasons for his farm
in the Cotswolds. Says that he has a 5yr Countryside Stewardship agreement. Next year , 50% of his
farm will be taken out of food production and one of his main reasons for doing this is that it has guarenteed
his income and de-risked the farm.
Food security
Bird seed
Enhanced Stubble
Harry next shows us a field which next year 2025 will be enhanced overwinter stubble or AB6. He had applied for the Government grant in August 2023 and got the grant at Xmas time. But by that time he had already put wheat in the ground . £589 per hectare .
Buffer Zones
Harry will also have 4 to 6m buffer zones on his cultivated land . This will entitle him to another Government grant called SW1 at £515 per hectare. he says he has about 4.5 hectares to use as this undisturbed wildlidfe areas and a sort of buffer zone.
Winter Dawsum wheat 2024
The winter Dawsum variety wheat is doing well. Sprayed with T1 fungicide in April . Says he has 102 hectares . Agricultural chemicals cost £43,200, Fertilisers cost £18,400, and seed was £7,100. Wheat across UK has struggled (especially places like Lincs and Yorks) and total harvest for the UK 35% down. So wheat prices per ton already rising from £160 to well over £200.
Harry's Farm is like all farms: It's a business that needs to make a profit . It is not his function to worry about whether there is sufficient food to feed the UK. This is what Harry Metcalf says about it all in his Youtube video of 22 April 2024.
In 2021 he was harvesting 330 acres of food (wheat , Barely etc) . By 2025 the Government schemes that he has joined will improve his soil and guarantee his income whilst reducing his farm food production to 120 acres. This is at a time when UK population has risen by millions of people (15% increase).
Commenting on particular crops, Harry says:
- Most wheat on his farm is used to feed intensive system chickens. This is quick, low carbon, profitable and cheap (chicken is one third the price that it was in 1970)
- Soya, chick peas, Linseed - they are easy to grow but they are unreliable (and therefore whether he makes a profit or not is a high risk). Harry has therefore joined a Gov scheme where he turns half his farm over to non food (eg enhanced stubble) and gets a guaranteed income for it from UK Gov
- Vegetables - Are difficult if not impossible for English farmers to economically grow on steep, or other unsuitable (eg stony) land and equipment required is expensive. Any English farmer that can make a profit out of vegetables is already doing so . Other farmers are unlikely to get in to vegetable business
Tree planters outbidding Farmers in Scottish uplands
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| Farmers Weekly 20 April 2024 |
Farmers Weekly article commented that at the moment, a lot of land in Scotland is being bought up by large organisations as part of carbon capture / carbon offset schemes and to de-carbonise the built environment .