Farms and crofts facing ‘significant challenges’
Comment Brian Henderson
A new report says “significant challenges” could be faced by farming and crofting communities in the Highlands and Islands after Brexit.
It assesses the likely impacts of different Brexit scenarios on the economy and communities, their effects on wildlife, the environment and tourism.
Called Post-brexit Implications for Agriculture and Associated Land Use in the Highlands and Islands, it says declining agricultural activity, land abandonment and a shrinking workforce could be
accelerated. These trends, the report says, could have negative effects on environmental land management and food and drink and tourism.
The Highlands and Islands Agriculture Support Group (HIASG) which commissioned the analysis, has called on the Scottish Government to provide a targeted response for crofting and farming.
The work was carried out by Dr Andrew Moxey of Pareto Consulting and Steven Thomson of SRUC for HIASG. The report is being presented at an event in Edinburgh today.
Douglas Irvine, economic development manager for Shetland Islands Council and chairman of HIASG, said: “This report is a wake-up call and shows how important farming and crofting is to the economy, people and environment of the Highlands and Islands, but also how vulnerable it is.
“We urge the Scottish Government to ensure future farming and rural policy and funding responds effectively to the scale of the challenges faced by this region and is well targeted.”
More than two-thirds of Scotland’s “high nature value” farmland is located in the Highlands and Islands region.
The region has areas designated for its national and international environmental importance which benefits birds and wildlife.
Vicki Swales, head of land use policy at RSPB Scotland, said: “We call on the Scottish Government to ensure that in future the environmental land management carried out by farmers and crofters are properly supported and rewarded.”
Well, despite sounding like the product launch for a new shampoo, England’s “Health and Harmony” command paper – which actually looked at the future for food, farming and the environment “in a green Brexit”– reached the end of its public consultation period last Tuesday.
And with a reported 44,000 responses received on the subject, it didn’t seem to go un-noticed.
But while the exercise drew the predictable mixed reaction, possibly including as many different opinions as it received responses, being primarily confined to the situation south of the Border – with the mandatory bits about devolved administrations and Uk-wide policy thrown in for good measure – it didn’t set the heather on fire in Scotland.
But while the document may have had little direct relevance to us, the responses did highlight the fact that they’ve at least had something to chew over south of the Border, while we in Scotland haven’t yet had anything official to get our teeth into.
Now there might well be a justified grievance underlying the weekend’s resurrection of the hoary old uplift convergence chestnut. But, together with arguments over post-brexit power grabs, this constant politicking which is detracting from the urgent need to knuckle down and draw up a policy tailored to the needs of Scotland’s farmers is beginning to look more like dodging the bullet rather than biting it.
True, we are due to see the agricultural champions follow up last autumn’s interim discussion document
0 The heather failed to ignite for Health and Harmony with their final recommendations for the Scottish Government later this month – and a similar report from the National Council of Rural Advisors is set to be delivered later in the summer.
But it might be fair to ask if there has really been a need for all these focus groups to scout out solutions for the Scottish Government – especially when you realise just how many publications, reviews and consultations on the topic are already gathering dust on shelves in the Scottish Parliament’s library.
In 2006 we had “A Forward Strategy for Scottish Agriculture: Next Steps”, in 2010 we had “A vision for Scottish Agriculture”. And while I may well have missed some others in between we also had the glossy “The Future of Scottish Agriculture: a Discussion Document” in 2015 – which, after an underwhelming launch at the Highland show, was supposed to open a year of discussion about how we should move forward with Scottish agriculture.
In 2016, the Scottish Government produced a summary document, which basically said that the vision was sound and that there should be a focus on improving the industry’s competitiveness while enhancing environmental sustainability, the latter point being backed up by the Griggs’ group report into how greening measures could be improved.
And NFU Scotland has been trying to push the agenda forward with its series of “Change” documents looking at key areas of policy. And they won’t be the only carefully argued wish-lists being drawn up by bodies with an interest in the countryside.
So, with tomorrow marking the last call for this year’s SAF forms, what might future May the 15ths hold for Scotland’ farmers?
It might be foolish to predict what new schemes might look like – but at the current rate of progress it’s a pretty safe bet that for some time to come they’ll look disappointingly like the system we have now.
For with Brexit now only months away there’s going to be no time to bring in anything new in the early stages – for not only will policy need to be formulated but schemes and methods of delivery will also have to be set up - and while the civil service might be a wonderful organisation, it has a tendency to be averse to change.
And let’s not forget the IT system. £180 million (and counting) to get the current system up and running – and although it has been claimed that it is future proof and can be adapted to handle almost any type of policy, the monumental fiasco delivering the schemes it was designed to operate would give the lie to such assertions.
So in the early days of Brexit it’s pretty likely to be a case of, as our soon to be more distant cousins in France might say, “plus ca change, plus c’est la meme chose”.