Change LFA support to keep hill farmers Farming!

CHANGE LFA SUPPORT TO KEEP HILL FARMERS FARMING!
“PAYING a hill farmer £500 yearly to keep a suckler cow is a better way of conserving our countryside than eventually having to pay a contractor £500 an acre to clear whins from abandoned upland fields!”
The blunt view of Dr Herbert Diemont, chairman of the influential Rural European Platform, expressed visiting the Kilkeel farm of National Beef Association NI chairman Oisin Murnion reports Rodney Magowan.
 “Keep a hill farm viable and a hill farming family remain in the community protecting a centuries old landscape and producing suckler calves, a quality raw material for the beef industry,” added Dr Diemont from the Centre for Ecosystem Studies, Wageningen University in the Netherlands.
 Others walking the NBA chairman’s farm during a European workshop for farmers and conservations organised by the Ulster Wildlife Trust were equally outspoken on urgently needed Less Favoured Area support changes.
  Sustainable business development specialist Dr Reinier de Man from Leiden, also in the Netherlands, said more rural development funds must go to real rural dwellers, who actually care for the countryside.  What proportion of rural development funding, he asked, actually goes to land owners?
  Dr Hilary Kirkpatrick from the Ulster Wildlife Trust noted that in areas such as the western Mournes the rising number of abandoned field are quickly swamped by whins.
HEALTHY
 “Unless EU policy as applied in areas such as this makes farming viable landscapes will be lost. Farming landscapes are crucial for biodiversity, contributing to a healthy, functioning environment on which we, and following generations, will depend.”
 A comment supported by David Hawthorn from the National Trust,
  “ Producing livestock that helps keep farms viable and meat plants busy supplying a secure source of food is also, with the right policy changes, going to keep the landscape safe for centuries to come. Fail to act and where the Mountains of Mourne sweep down to the sea so beloved by Percy French becomes a mere bank of bracken and whin.”
 For Oisin Murnion with only 40 acres of stonewall enclosed lowland around the home farm utilising open mountain is vital.
 However, of over a 100 landowners with a share in grazing 1,920 ha of Mourne Mountain West only half a dozen still make full use of their right. As the visitors from across Europe sadly saw abandoned fields and almost abandoned lanes are now a feature of the mountainside.
 Only by developing a conservation grazing service using Galloway cattle has Oisin maintained a viable farm business supplying stock to the National Trust to graze areas such as Murlough sand dunes and to landowners with uninhabited islands in Strangford Lough.
 “The NBA, the voice of the beef industry, calls on decision makers in Belfast, London and, above all, Brussels to recognise the urgency of this situation and seize the opportunity to improve LFA support.” Oisin said.
 “ Over 800 beef and suckler herds in Northern Ireland are inside the LFA as is 80% of our total land area.
 “Unless action is taken to make hill cattle and sheep farming viable not only will a way of life pass away with the older generation of hill farmers, but so will our landscape, a unique asset.
REDMEAT
 “An asset not only for our ecosystem, but an attraction for tourists that can also remain a source of suckler calves, store and breeding lambs for our redmeat industry.
 “An industry that amidst all the prevailing economic gloom provides on and off farm employment for a huge proportion of our workforce.
 “At the same time how we as farmers manage the hills also requires careful planning. For example, the switch away from pure Blackie sheep to cross breds changes grazing patterns dramatically. Unlike Scottish Blackface crossbreds, now needed to produce better carcasses and returns, rarely graze higher mountains.
 “This change alone can have a dramatic impact on mountain flora and fauna. On this farm Galloway cattle have successfully taken the place of Blackface sheep both as regards generating income and an ability to graze bleak open mountainside.
 “The need for gradual planned change to protect our landscape and the farming businesses that have created and protected it is increasingly clear. The National Beef Association urges politicians and civil servants to recognise the urgent need to up grade LFA support under the Common Agricultural Policy to face reality. Change is vital as our upland landscapes and their farming communities are already seriously damaged.
 “On a personal level I hope the current debate on how the Mournes are managed, with or without a National Park, will generate fresh ideas and a revamped method of taking decisions on the utilisation of open shared land left in trust to us by previous generations.
 “A practical policy to protect the past and produce a viable farming future is needed if younger folk living in areas such as the Mournes are to be anything other than commuters or weekend cottagers!
 “The greatest threat to our uplands lies not in the hills, but in the higher echelons of government and the EU. There, I fear, the understanding of hill farming is minimal.”
  For further details of National Beef Association lobbying for a better beef industry from hill to high street contact NI secretary David Rankin, tel 077 9310 7087.