Crofter admits he fears for future of a whole way of life
DONALD Mackinnon is acutely aware of the difficulties the industry faces and admits he fears for the future.
For Mr Mackinnon, who runs a small 20-acre homestead with 30 sheep at Arnol on the Isle of Lewis, believes that if incomes continue to decline then it could spell the end for crofting.
He said: “Everything that farmers and crofters have to spend on continues to go up, but what we get for our produce does not and neither do the subsidies. The price of lamb in the Highlands, fluctuates but it really has not gone up for years.
“We get the same price now as maybe people got in the 80s. When you look at what we have to spend on fuel and feed, they have gone up substantially, and all the other costs associated with agriculture. The real issue, is that the value of the produce has not kept pace with inflation and subsidies are supposed to step in then, and fill that gap, but it is just not at the right level.”
There are few full-time crofters on Lewis with people having to supplement their income with other jobs such as weaving or fishing. Mr Mackinnon, who by day is a community association development officer, maintains that crofting is a “really important way of allowing people in remote communities in the Highlands and Islands to supplement their income” and stops people from leaving remote communities. He warned: “If you cannot make money out of it then you are left to subsidise it from the income you have from elsewhere, and not everybody can do that. That is not sustainable. Even if you are not a full-time crofter, if the income from the enterprise is not enough to make it sustainable, then crofting is not going to last. Crofting is not just about farming the land, it is about communities and keeping people in rural areas at the end of the day.”