‘We stay positive in the face of the challenges UK farming is facing’
One Calderdale farmer is determined to stay positive in the face of all the challenges UK farming is facing at the moment.
Rachel Hallos farms with husband Stephen at the Yorkshire Water-tenanted, 2,000-acre Beeston Hall Farm, near Ripponden.
She has recently taken on the role of West Riding NFU County Chairman for a further two years and is currently the North-East Area NFU regional chairman.
In my near three decades of interviewing farmers I cannot recall the same person being a county chairman for four years successively, although I”m sure someone will put me right. Certainly very few will have taken on the role in such a short time after initially getting involved.
“For me it was the referendum in 2016 that made me want to find out more,” says Rachel.
“Our farm has been through some very difficult times and we found solutions through the NFU.
“I feel that the organisation has so much to offer.
“I try to be open. We can’t all be experts at everything, and I don’t try to blow smoke up people if I don’t know something.
“I’m now in my third year as West Riding NFU county chairman. To me it’s unfinished business, there is so much going on that I want to see through.
“I find the whole process of bringing things about unbelievably fascinating and fulfilling.
“The Agriculture Bill, as it stands at the moment doesn’t deliver what it needs to deliver. It doesn’t do everything it could potentially do, and it doesn’t talk about food. I know they (the Government) are talking about covering the food standards side in the Trade Bill.
“There has been talk of assuring farming of the same support as was received through the EU, but as yet there are a lot of ifs, buts and maybes.
“We want to know how UK agriculture can survive, how we can compete, against other imports from other countries and the Agriculture Bill is seen by many as a once in a generation opportunity to sort out the level playing field they’ve been wanting for years.
“The predominantly proBrexit cabinet appears to have a lot of free traders who believe in complete access to all markets both for imports and exports, and as such I don’t think they like anything that gets in their way, such as putting on additional wording about standards.
“I really hope I’m wrong, and that through the Agriculture Bill and Trade Bill, food entering the UK will be monitored on grounds of health and animal welfare, because I believe UK agriculture can deliver so much more than purely getting paid ‘public money for public goods’, as it appears to be all about at present.
“What the talks about the Agriculture Bill have succeeded in doing is getting together what can sometimes be a fragmented number of organisations that represent farming, food and the countryside.
“That cohort of farm and countryside-based representatives
Wearing her West Riding and North East Region NFU hats, Rachel would usually have covered thousands of miles in the past nine weeks at meetings up and down the countryside.
Instead, it has been a whole new world of Zoom and Microsoft Teams meetings.
“I had a really enlightening Zoom chat with the Food Ethics Council recently who report that lockdown has rekindled the love of food and cooking in the UK ... we just want the Government to take clearer steps to supporting our amazing industry that keeps on producing tremendous quality food to the highest standards.”
‘We want to know how UK agriculture can survive and compete against imports.’