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Secretary of State for Wales Stephen Crabb, Prime Minister David Cameron and FUW President Glyn Roberts[/caption]
The Farmers’ Union of Wales met with Prime Minister David Cameron last week to reinforce the importance of staying in the EU from an agriculture perspective.
The FUW has for many years maintained a clear position on Wales’ membership of the European Union, and was the first Union to declare its support for the ‘Stronger in Europe’ campaign.
“We were honoured to meet with Prime Minister David Cameron last week to discuss how a Brexit would affect farming businesses and were pleased to hear him reinforce the message that we are stronger in Europe,” said FUW President Glyn Roberts.
The visit took place at Tyfos, Corwen, a farming enterprise extending to over 1,000 acres of land in the Dee Valley and in the Berwyn Mountains.
The Williams family moved to Tyfos over 100 years ago and Richard and David are the fourth generation at the farm.
Over the years there has been a substantial expansion of the enterprise. The business partnership is always extremely keen to reinvest in the farm enterprise by diversifying into renewable energy and this has already involved installing solar panels and a small 30 Kwh hydro scheme and an anaerobic digester.
“As a Union we will continue to support the ‘Stronger in Europe’ campaign so that fifth generation family farms such as Tyfos have a future in agriculture,” added Mr Roberts.
The severity of the uncertainty of a Brexit is becoming clearer to the agricultural industry as the Prime Minister further announced that if farmers had to rely on World Trade Organisation rules rather than EU membership to secure access to the European market, farmers could be faced with tariffs costing £240m a year for beef and £90m for lamb.
“We have to be clear on the facts before we cast our vote - a vote that will affect our future generations and the sustainability and viability of our rural economies.
“A Brexit would mean that farmers still have to comply with all the current rules and regulations but would not have any say on what they are or how future legislation is shaped,” added Mr Roberts.
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FUW Managing Director Alan Davies with Prime Minister David Cameron[/caption]