The woman who founded the Welsh company that produces Ffermio, the popular S4C TV programme which deals exclusively with agricultural issues, has been presented with the Farmers' Union of Wales Bob Davies Memorial Award.

The award - in memory of Farmers Weekly Wales correspondent Bob Davies, of Welshpool, who died in November 2009, aged 69 - is offered to a media personality who has raised the public profile of Welsh farming.

Receiving the award - a shepherd's crook specially carved by Aberystwyth stick maker Hywel Evans - from FUW president Emyr Jones, Swansea-based Telesgop managing director Elin Rhys said: "Being chosen for this prestigious award is a great honour.

"To be acknowledged in this way means a lot to me and I'm deeply grateful to the FUW for considering that I'm worthy of the award."

After leaving college, Mrs Rhys started work as a scientist with Welsh Water, travelling around South Wales taking water samples from rivers and sewage works to monitor water quality.

By the mid-1980s she had moved to a completely different career. Starting as a researcher for HTV on a weekly Welsh language science programme, she soon turned her hand at presenting and very quickly became one of the most famous and recognised faces on TV in Wales.

She went on to present a wide range of entertainment and outdoor pursuits programmes for HTV in Welsh and in English, including the National Eisteddfod for the BBC 2 network. Soon she was a regular face on BBC network programmes fronting science and education series.

After the birth of her daughter Ffion in 1992, Elin changed tack and formed her own company - Teledu Telesgop - which started life in 1993 in the back room of the family home near Llandeilo.

Within a few years the company was operating from an office in Llandeilo and then moved to Swansea in 2004. Today Telesgop is based in Ethos at SA1 in Swansea and employs 35 full time staff specialising in agricultural, science and wildlife programmes.

During her TV career Elin has been chair of TAC, the body that represents the independent TV companies in Wales and had represented the industry on a number of committees and other bodies.

Mr Jones said: "Elin Rhys fully deserves to receive this award, not only for giving us the ever-popular Ffermio programme since 1997, but also for ensuring that her company provides so much important information to farmers and the wider audience."

Last December Telesgop retained the contract for BBC Wales's coverage of the Royal Welsh Show, after winning it back for another two years in an open tender. The company's relationship with the Royal Welsh goes back over 15 years, having pioneered S4C's live Welsh language coverage and winning the contract for the BBC in 2008.

In May Telesgop received the Live Event Coverage nomination for this year's BAFTA Cymru awards for Richard Rees and Branwen Davies' work at last year's Royal Welsh Show.

Welsh farmers want more fibre and wireless connections to help speed up broadband connections to their farms and cut the number of "not-spots" in the countryside.

That was the message delivered by Farmers' Union of Wales deputy president Glyn Roberts at the Royal Welsh Show today (Wednesday July 20).

He called for a similar scheme to one being rolled out in Cornwall where superfast broadband is expected to be available at half of the county's telephone exchanges by the autumn of next year.

"One of the objectives of us union officials is to create a favourable environment for members to run a sustainable agricultural business. One tool in this tool box is to have as good as possible a connection in terms of broadband.

"Welsh farmers want more fibre and wireless connections to help speed up broadband reception to their farms and cut the number of 'not-spots' in the countryside.

"We now have a chance to make this possible. Some important examples of services on the internet for agriculture are VAT, self assessment tax and BCMS cattle movement.

"There are a vast number of other usages that can increase the efficiency of our business e.g. benchmarking, trading on line and general research.

"Statistically, even back in 2001, New Zealand farmers who used IT had a 5% higher profit margin compared to those that did not see the advantages of using IT.

"Internet retail sales in the UK hit £22 billion in 2010 compared to £9 billion in 2006 and it is set to grow by a further £14 billion by 2014.

"It is also essential that our children and other members of our rural communities should have fast broadband internet access so that they are not left behind the rest of the country.

"A successful Internet broadband project was launched in Cornwall, so let us in Wales exploit the same opportunity and get the same benefits.

The Cornwall project is expected to create 4,000 new jobs and protect a further 2,000 existing jobs. It will make Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly one of the best connected places in the world.

"The FUW has been calling for improved broadband services for almost a decade. We want to see rural Wales becoming equally well connected to broadband as Cornwall," Mr Roberts added.

The Farmers' Union of Wales today welcomed Defra's recognition that action must be taken in England to combat bovine TB in badgers and called on the Welsh Government to take similar account of the severity of the situation facing Welsh farmers.

Speaking after a meeting with Welsh animal health minister John Griffiths, FUW president Emyr Jones said: "While there are significant differences between the English and Welsh badger culling proposals, the science makes it clear that both approaches can be expected to yield major reductions in TB incidences.

"Given the importance of cross-border trade between England and Wales any moves to tackle this devastating disease in England are welcome."

Mr Jones said the Welsh Government's decision to review plans to cull badgers in north Pembrokeshire had sparked indignation amongst the farming community as farming families continued to reel from the impact of this devastating disease on a daily basis.

"While there has been an encouraging downward trend in incidences in Wales, in the proposed culling area of north Pembrokeshire incidences have not fallen despite the fact that the area has the strictest cattle control measures in the whole of the UK.

"England has recognised the need to take action, rather than further procrastinate, and Wales must do the same by ensuring that the review of the science is completed as soon as possible."

Family farms - the backbone of Welsh rural communities - must be the main players in future food production, Farmers' Union of Wales president Emyr Jones said at the Royal Welsh Show today.

Addressing a Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors business breakfast, Mr Jones said politicians and civil servants seem to have finally woken up to the fact that food is quite an important commodity - especially when you haven't got any.

"Talking about the greater good and the terrifying challenges facing the world over the coming decades, some would have us believe the only way forward is to farm on an industrial scale and that the family farm is simply the preserve of the niche market," he said.

"Well, the old saying goes that to know your future you must know your past. So what does past production in Wales tell us about the importance of our average and smaller sized family farms?

"Are the proponents of industrial scale farming right about the usefulness of the majority of those who will visit this showground over the coming days?"

The FUW attempts to answer such questions in a report recently presented to Defra minister Jim Paice stressing that our family farms "which we all know are the backbone of our communities" must also be considered to be the main players in terms of future food production.

The report was drawn up in response to evidence by Mr Paice to a House of Lords Select Committee when he claimed smaller farms would not contribute greatly to the growth of UK food production and productivity, and that UK government-sponsored research would, therefore, be geared towards large farms.

"This paper puts the record straight with the Minister, and underlines the fact that any moves which are biased in favour of larger farms would compromise the viability of our most productive holdings, and have a negative overall impact on agricultural production."

"Under the pre-2005 Common Agricultural Policy, it was Welsh farms with between 75 and 500 acres of forage area that were the most productive in Wales and these farms were responsible for around 80% of Welsh production.

"Even in the lowlands, average productivity for farms with 120 acres of land was the same as for farms with 950 acres, while lowland farms of 330 acres or smaller were responsible for 75% of Welsh lowland production.

"That was before 2005, but I know from my visits to farms throughout Wales that things have not changed dramatically in terms of production patterns, and these figures give us a clear indication of the importance of ensuring that policies are aimed at protecting family farms.

"These farms are where the majority of our food is produced in Wales and we must all strive to ensure it stays that way otherwise we risk seeing our rural society put back a century, accompanied by a significant risk in terms of food production.

"So, whether we are talking about the post-2013 CAP, domestic policies, WTO negotiations, or any other of the vast array of issues which impact on farming, it is clear that protecting the interests of the Welsh family farm should be at the centre of all our lobbying efforts.

"That is certainly what my priority will be over my coming term of office as president of the Farmers' Union of Wales."