Following the election of Bala sheep and beef farmer Emyr Jones as president of the Farmers’ Union of Wales during the union’s annual general meeting last Friday, the rest of the influential finance and organisation committee members were revealed today.
Mr Jones’s deputy will be Glyn Roberts, Dylasau Uchaf, Padog, Betws-Y-Coed, Conwy, who has been one of the union’s three vice presidents since 2004.
Having completed a full-time agricultural course at Glynllifon College in 1976, and not being a farmer's son, he went to work as a shepherd at Dylasau Uchaf - a 350-acre farm owned by the National Trust which he secured the tenancy of in 1983.
From 2006-2008 he was the FUW’s representative on the board of Hybu Cig Cymru (HCC) and for the past three years he has been a Welsh Assembly Government appointment non-executive director on the HCC board.
Carmarthenshire dairy farmer Brian Walters was re-elected one of the three vice presidents with Welsh Black Cattle breeder Lorraine Howells, of Rhymney, Gwent, and sheep farmer Richard Vaughan, of Tywyn, Meirionnydd, the other two.
Anglesey and Pembrokeshire dairy farmers Eifion Huws and Brian Thomas were elected north and south Wales representatives on the committee respectively.
Brian Walters, farms a 500-acre holding, with his wife Ann and sons Aled and Seimon, near Carmarthen. They have a dairy herd of 200 cows - some of which are pedigree Ayrshires - with 200 followers and 40 beef cattle. They also run a self-catering farmhouse holiday unit and take pride in educating the occupants on the problems and joys of farming.
Miss Howells, who has been the south Wales member of the finance and organisation committee since 2000 and farms Cwm Carno Farm, a 220-acre hill farm most comprising reclaimed opencast land with common grazing.
The farm carries a suckler herd of pedigree Welsh Black cattle and South Wales Mountain ewes, and has been in the family for over 100 years.
Mr Vaughan and his wife Dwynwen’s Pall Mall Farm north of Tywyn is one of two holdings, totalling 550 acres. Most of the land is at Pant y Panel and Prysglwyd at Rhydymain, near Dolgellau.
A flock of 750 Welsh Mountain Sheep is kept, together with 150 ewe lambs replacements. Around 200 ewes are crossed with Texel and Suffolk rams, and the remainder with Welsh Mountain. Approximately 30 store cattle are kept and fattened over the summer.
Mr Huws has been an active member of the finance and organisation committee for the past five years. He is also chairman of the union’s milk and dairy produce committee.
He farms at Penrhos, Bodedern, a dairy farm with a 140-head pedigree Ayrshire herd which has an outstanding production and show record.
Mr Huws, a highly respected Ayrshire cattle judge, travels the length and breadth of the country, and in Europe, representing the dairy industry in the hope of acquiring better conditions and prices for farmers.
Mr Thomas is currently establishing a herd of pedigree beef shorthorn cattle and increasing the size of his sheep flock as well as growing some cereals on his 280-acre farm, Llwyncelyn Lan, Llanfyrnach. He is also developing a new garage and MOT station in Crymych in conjunction with his previous tenant.
During the 1996 BSE outbreak, Mr Thomas was one of the lead campaigners in South West Wales opposing the importation of inferior beef into Wales. Having heard a report on the BBC regarding protests at Holyhead harbour he arranged a meeting in Crymych and addressed over 1,500 farmers.
In 1997 he led a group of 10 farmers to Tesco’s stand at the Royal Welsh Show to address them about the unfair way in which they were treating the industry.