It’s time to give ‘grassroots’ of farming credit
THERE was a great deal of celebration and back-slapping going on at the beginning of the week when it was announced that Scotland’s food exports had risen to new record levels.
Politicians were quick to jump on the bandwagon and to use the news to their own ends.
While some used it to show that Brexit was a threat to the industry and without full access to the EU single market, we’ll be in trouble. Others used it show that once we shake off the ties of the EU, we will have a fantastic foundation to build on.
What none of them pointed out was just how little of this boom in exports actually filters its way down to the farmers and crofters who produce the raw products.
We have shaken off the deep-fried Mars Bar image which Scottish cuisine once had as our salmon, shellfish, beef and lamb are served up in the best restaurants in the world.
By far the biggest export earner is, of course, whisky.
Other food and drink manufacturers have taken a leaf out of the distillers’ book because they don’t just sell a product but they sell the image too.
No matter if the stuff is actually manufactured in a tin shed on an industrial estate on the edge of one of our big towns or cities, the image they sell is of the country’s hills and glens, mountains and woods, lochs and seashores, all wrapped up in a tartan sash.
But, as they do this they seem to forget that they rely on the people on the groundd in the countryside, who actually grow the barley that’s made into the whisky, the wheat that makes the flour for the shortbread, and who tend the sheep and lambs, cows and calves that give us such wonderful cuts and joints of meat.
And so with Scottish food and drink exports growing by £421 million in 2016, to a record level of £5.5 billion, surely it’s only fair that a slice of that makes its way back to the farm?
With a new strategy for the country’s food and drink sector unveiled the same week, all the right noises might have beenn made about ensuring that farming’s voice was heard.
But whether any real action will be takenn to address the situation remains to be seen n – for while everyone is keen to associate with success, it’s a harder job to tackle an underlying problem.