travel – The Lakeland Auctioneer

Recently I sat in the kitchen of a hill farming family. They had spent the last two days gathering hefted sheep from the fell. They were exhausted. With a few thousand sheep from various farms now having been removed from this common alone, under environmental de-stocking schemes, their ancient hefts all but destroyed.

It had taken two days to find their sheep further down the fells, in different valleys, among steep and dangerous crags many miles from home. With visible emotion they described how they and their dogs had almost worked themselves to death. How they were scared for their lives, the dogs’ lives and the sheep that were grazing in places that they were neither acclimatised nor accustomed to. This is one of the detrimental effects of de-stocking, but it is not recognised nor understood by some conservation organisations, landed estates or those making the schemes.

Other hill shepherds have shared the same story with me. Fighting through growing swathes of bracken, increased tick infestations, sheep replaced by expanding wild deer herds. And all of this slowly but surely intensifying pressure on the sheep flocks and the shepherds that are battling on.

Farmers are a stoic lot, head down, keep going, don’t grumble and don’t let the buggers get you down. But the time is fast approaching when the critical mass of sheep we need to ensure a future for hill farming in Cumbria, and the continuation of the managed landscapes that farmers get so little credit for, may be fast approaching.

It appears that due diligence on the schemes has been limited. This is at a time when demand for sheep meat is rising, the supply is falling and the effects of the loss of hill sheep to the national industry could well be catastrophic in years to come. Auctioneers will be chasing a dwindling supply of lambs to sell to an expanding ring of customers. Agricultural suppliers will have less demand for their services as farmers reduce livestock or just give up. All of this must surely hurt the local rural economy. Perhaps this is looked upon as acceptable collateral damage in the name of nature?

All of this need not be happening, but it is, and it might be just what many of the large, landed estates and the most tunnel visioned conservation organisations want to happen. There is more money for them in environmental schemes than sheep and shepherds.

Some of us sit in partnership and stakeholder meetings like a stuck record constantly giving this narrative, but we’re being swallowed up by the nature and net zero noise. Or worse, people from other organisations contact me privately to express concern or even agree but dare not say so publicly, having to toe the line.

So farmers, auctioneers, rural business and country folk, the time has come. Either speak up or hold your peace. There may not be much time left. We will rue the day when my friends like that farming family are forced to throw in the towel for their own health and sanity.

In the meantime, my belief is that we need a moratorium on the schemes and our rural land use framework in Cumbria. We need to halt tunnel-visioned de-stocking policies, where nature and net zero trumps everything. We need to find the sweet spot that gives us viable sustainable livestock farming in improved landscapes in true partnership.

56% of UK farmland sold last year was bought by non-farmers. What is that telling us about our food security. What is manifesting is real-time destruction of Cumbrian hill-farming, the local economy and our rural communities. Death by a thousand cuts. Does anyone care? I’m not seeing it.

We took off to Morocco in mid-January for a few days of warm sunshine in Agadir. It was a nice hotel and after the over-enthusiastic animations team had got the message that we would not be partaking in “very special dart competition” or “very special aqua-fit” in an Arctic-temperature pool, we finally enjoyed the peace and quiet.

Out and about, I got talking to a taxi driver from a farming family. He shared his concerns that his countries drive to produce more food for export was beginning to cause huge problems. Landing into Agadir airport I had already noticed just how much more farmland was now under plastic, trying to satisfy winter-demand for fruit and vegetables from countries like the UK. I took this photo on final-approach.

The Moroccan told me that farmers were extremely worried as there had been no meaningful rainfall in South Morrocco for several years. He took me to a bone-dry riverbed that once irrigated an entire region. It had been dry for a long-time. He showed me acres of dying Argan orchards, parched to death. He complained bitterly that the price of Argan oil had quadrupled in the shops over the last couple of years.

He explained that the melt waters of the Atlas Mountains and the natural aquifers that have irrigated crops, for decades are running out. Climate change, an expanding population and an increase in global demand are putting huge pressure on the country’s natural resources. House building is going on at an incredible rate as people from the inland Morocco are flocking to Agadir hopeful of work. Over 38,000 people have arrived in the last two years. Our driver simply shook his head. It was so obvious that this is not sustainable.

With nowt better to do towards the end of the holiday, I took it upon myself to research the importation of foodstuffs to the UK from Morocco. In one year to the end of Q3 2024, we imported over £500,000 (half a billion) fruit and vegetables, a rise of 21.5% in just one year. No wonder the sea of plastic on farmland around Agadir had so visibly increased.

Morocco is only one example of the increasing pressures of climate and population. There are many more areas across the globe beginning to feel the pain. All of those goods are imported cheaply but at what cost to both the environment and our home production? Today UK fruit farmers are grubbing out orchards, being paid as little as 6p per bag of apples for the home market. Our horticulture sector has been in decline for years, replaced by imported fruit and vegetables.

Last year UK vegetable production decreased by 4.9% to 2.2 million tonnes. Home-grown fruit down 12% to 585 thousand tonnes. These are DEFRA horticulture statistics and they are chilling.

We need to wake up. Right now, we’re focussing so much on Net Zero and Nature to heal our planet, and yet we turn a blind eye to our failing food security, actively reducing our food self-sufficiency whilst exporting the very issues we’re trying to address in our own country. We’re contributing to a global climate issue whilst patting ourselves on the back that we’re doing our bit for the planet by re-purposing our own productive farmland.

UK farmers contribute around 10% of UK greenhouse gas emissions in order to produce just over half of the food we eat. Right now, farming is an easy target. It seems there is absolutely no concern about food security in the UK. We’re being fed in part by a growing sea of plastic across the globe, but in the end, at what true cost to people and planet?