Focus on performance to deflect risks from Brexit
Farmers should treat the uncertainty of Brexit – along with the possibility of Indyref 2 – like the weather and world markets: external factors outside their control with which they have simply have to cope.
And while the remainder of 2017 was likely to see a plan developing for an orderly Brexit, it could be many years before its full impact on UK farming can be gauged, a leading team of consultants warned at the Highland Show yesterday.
Advising farmers to concentrate on what they can control – the performance of their own businesses – farm consultants Andersons said that, with the date for Brexit now fixed at March 2019, the type of trade arrangements concluded in the negotiations with the EU were pivotal to the future of the industry.
In a Highland Show briefing, the organisation also warned that if no deal was struck, then the impositions of tariffs on farm goods would radically change the market dynamics.
“Different outcomes may result for different sectors, depending on whether the UK is currently a net importer (eg beef) or exporter (eg lamb) to the EU,” said director David Siddle.
“Our view is that support payments will also fall post-brexit, albeit over a period of years. Although the Scottish Government might have an aspiration to keep payments at current levels, there will be other calls on the budget.”
He said that until the UK formally left the EU, the basic payment scheme would continue to operate.
“Our view is that the current scheme will be retained – with some tweaks – through to 2020 whilst a new policy is put in place,” he said. “It might be hoped that the payments system might even be working by then. Current rural development funding will also remain available until Brexit.”
The report revealed that the gap between the best and the simply averages businesses in UK agriculture was widening.
“The difference in performance is almost wholly down to management. Farm businesses need to ‘fix the roof whilst the sun is shining’. The process of Brexit is full of uncertainty, but tougher times could well lie ahead.”
Siddle added: “there is no ‘magic bullet’. It is a question of finding a structure and system that suits the farm and its proprietors, and then operating this with timeliness and attention to detail.”