Farmers’ Union of Wales President Glyn Roberts and Deputy President Ian Rickman have met with the agriculture leads of the main political parties in the run-up to the Welsh Senedd elections, highlighting industry concerns and the Union’s key manifesto asks.

Welcoming the opportunity to query various pledges made by the parties in their manifestos the President and Deputy President were able to emphasise the importance of the next Government committing to stability, family farms, supporting rural communities and Welsh jobs, sustainable agriculture and rewarding environmental outcomes.

The Union will hold the parties to account on their commitments to farming and work closely with the next Government to ensure future policies support thriving, sustainable family farms- for the benefit of the rural economy, the environment, food security and our unique rural culture and traditions.

Glamorgan beef and sheep farmers Richard Walker and his partner Rachel Edwards run Flaxland Farm - a 120 acre beef and sheep holding just outside of Barry, Glamorgan. The couple say they will have to give up keeping cattle if current Water Resources (Control of Agricultural Pollution) (Wales) Regulations are not adjusted to incorporate recommendations made by industry stakeholder groups. 

Richard and Rachel keep 35 breeding cows and 130 breeding ewes and are at the end of their tether.

“We’ve had a session with Farming Connect to see what we need to be doing, and it didn’t really tell us anything we didn’t already know, apart from that we have enough ground to cope with how much slurry we produce. So we wouldn’t have to export. But we would have to cover one of the existing yards, which is an awkward shape, plus cover where we scrape slurry to, and also put in a slurry store. Which we don’t have at the moment,” said Rachel Edwards. 

The need to urgently deal with bovine TB across Wales was hotly debated by the Farmers’ Union of Wales’ animal health and welfare committee at a recent virtual meeting ahead of the Welsh Senedd election in May.

Speaking at the meeting, Ian Lloyd, FUW Animal Health and Welfare Committee chairman said: “It is a sad reflection of the ongoing problems caused by Bovine TB that the disease still warrants such detailed discussions. While improvements have been made since 2009 in regard to new herd incidents, the latest statistics show that 9,762 animals were slaughtered in the year to December 2020 in Wales.” 

The failure of the Welsh Government's Agriculture white paper to refer to payment capping is shameful and raises major concerns that a regressive move away from the policy is being considered.

That is the view of Ceredigion farmer sheep Anwen Hughes, who says the FUW is right to highlight the issue amongst one of its ten key manifesto asks.

"FUW members have consistently supported the capping of farm payments in response to consultations over the past two decades, and we successfully lobbied for their introduction when it first became possible," said Mrs Hughes who farms around 138 acres, of which 99 acres are owned, 22.5 acres are on a lifetime farm tenancy and a further 17 acres are rented at Bryngido farm, just outside of Aberaeron in Ceredigion.

A limit on the amount of direct payments a farm business in Wales can receive was introduced in 2015 by the then minister Alun Davies.