Weather advice panel can help industry respond to a crisis

With many areas of Scotland suffering disruption duetothewetweatherover silage and harvest time – and some parts of the country enduring the wettest weather for 80 years – the new advisory panel set up to offer rapid advice to farmers held its first meeting yesterday.

Rural economy secretary Fergus Ewing said that the panel – the creation of which was announced at Agriscot – would draw on expertise from across the agricultural sector.

He said: “The panel, when triggered, will act as a taskforce for rapidly sharing information, best practice and encouraging cooperation across industry to help farmers and croft- 0 Fergus Ewing: Panel will share best practice ers respond effectively to challenging weather conditions, both in the short term and in building longer term resilience.”

The members of the panel were announced as: Chris Mcdonald, SAC; Stephen Field, SEPA; Mags Granger, RSABI; Neil Wilson, HSBC; Kevin Mills, AIC; Scott Walker and Gary Mitchell, NFUS.

Commenting after the first meeting, NFU Scotland’s Scott Walker said that changing weather patterns and extreme weather events were testing the resilience of Scotland’s farmers and crofters on a more regular basis than ever before.

He added: “This panel has the ability to learn from experience, share best practice and react quickly in times of crisis to make our industry more robust.

“This year’s prolonged wet weather has left many farmers across Scotland desperately short of forage, bedding and unable to access sodden ground to complete routine but necessary tasks like harvest, ploughing, planting and spreading slurry for months on end.”