FUW milk committee chair, Brian Walters, opened his farmgate on the eve of the Welsh Dairy Show 2024, to highlight the importance of family run dairy farms’ in Wales .
Farming 500 acres in Carmarthen with wife Ann and two sons, Aled and Seimon; the family run a dairy herd of 220 cows with 200 followers on an autumn block calving system with the emphasis of producing quality milk off grass.
Working as a team, the family employ one full time staff member and manage the majority of the machinery work themselves on the farm. This keeps costs down and offers them the flexibility to manage tasks like harvest, ploughing and slurry when it suits them, rather than balance contractors availability and weather.
Brian Walters says that as a family they seem to have struck the right balance. There are many challenges facing family farms like theirs and economies of scale increasingly disfavours the smaller setup both financially and practically, especially when finding those ‘marginal margins’ are ever more important to achieving financial stability.
For generations, farmers have safeguarded these dairy farms across Wales and have passed the traditional family farms from one generation to the next. The history of this most familiar food is clear to see with hundreds of milk stands standing guard over farm lanes and entrances across the countryside.
Being a keen advocate of transferring skills to the next generation, Brian and the family have offered student placement to nearly 20 agricultural youngsters from Coleg Gelli Aur Agricultural College.
Ensuring the next generation is given the best opportunity possible to work within this fantastic dairy sector is fundamentally important to them. It’s not only a farm business, it is a way of life.
Over the years the industry has not been shy in progressing and enhancing farm practices to improve the herd to maximise milk production, to boost efficiency and the welfare of these much respected animals.
The Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board (AHDB) survey into producer numbers in April 2024 reports a 6% decrease in dairy producers compared with the previous year. Yet, the volume of milk produced per farm continued to increase. As an industry dairy is evolving to having fewer but larger milk producers.
As a Union, the FUW continue to remind the Welsh Government and others that traditional family dairy farms need support to future proof their businesses and infrastructure with affordable and innovative solutions to overcome the plethora of challenges facing the industry and be an attractive career for the next generation.
These family farms are the backbone of not only other small businesses but the glue that holds the community, schools, chapels, village halls, shops and local pubs together. These farms are also places where the traditional skills of farming are passed on and where Welsh language, culture and rural skills are safeguarded.
One huge achievement the FUW played a fundamental role in successfully lobbying for in recent years is the new legislation to safeguard milk producers.
The Fair Dealing Obligations (Milk) Regulations 2024 was introduced this July with a one year period of transition for existing milk contracts to become compliant with the new rules. This is certainly a positive step forward for the sector that will help stamp out unfair contractual agreements.
The Welsh Dairy Show, held at the United Counties Showground in Nantyci, Carmarthen on Tuesday 22 of October gives the sector the opportunity to bring farmers, processors, co-operatives, businesses, sector leaders, unions and Government together to discuss the state of the dairy industry, look back on the year and plan for the year ahead.