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.

Farmers from Carmarthenshire took the opportunity to quiz their prospective Senedd Members for the Carmarthen East and Dinefwr constituency at a virtual hustings, which was hosted jointly on Zoom by the FUW, Wales YFC and NFU Cymru, on Tuesday 13 April. 

Speaking after the meeting, FUW Carmarthenshire County Executive Officer David Waters said: “Many members of the farming community took up this opportunity to pose questions to those that seek to represent them in Cardiff for the next Welsh Senedd term. 

“The big questions around NVZs, river pollution by water companies and future Welsh policies were high on the agenda and the FUW will continue to lobby on these.”