Farmers in Wales have voiced their anger and frustration following a BBC Countryfile programme broadcast on Sunday 15 March entitled ‘Looe Harbour’.

FUW President Glyn Roberts said: “We have once again received many complaints from our members about the latest BBC Countryfile programme, which adopted an unbalanced approach in reporting on the current Red Tractor Assurance Scheme. This has led to both anger and disappointment amongst the farming community.”

The criticism is just the latest in a long line of complaints about unbalanced BBC reporting, including by the Countryfile programme, and many farmers have reported that they have long since stopped watching the programme due to its ‘inherent bias against farming’.

Farmers from Anglesey have raised concerns about the future of farming with local MP Virginia Crosbie in light of the ongoing uncertainty on trade deals, food imports and the lack of frameworks in the UK.

In a meeting with the MP, who also sits on the Agriculture Bill Committee, Farmers’ Union of Wales officials highlighted that the Agriculture Bill does nothing to ensure food imported to the UK meets UK standards - despite previous ministerial assurances that imported food would meet our standards.

FUW Anglesey county chairman Richard Williams said: “We are very concerned about the direction of travel for agriculture. Hearing Farming Minister Victoria Prentis referring to the risk of 'creating considerable uncertainty' by legally protecting food production standards in trade deals, is a worry to say the least.

“In reality it is the UK Government which would be proactively creating such uncertainty by taking a position on trade which deliberately abandons our EU export markets and severs the established supply chains which extend across Europe. It's within their gift to avoid such uncertainty, and we urged Mrs Crosbie to do all she could to help protect our farmers and consumers from a flood of poor quality food products.”

FUW Anglesey County Vice Chairman William Spencer Hughes added: “We work very hard and to very strict rules and regulations. Some of the food that could land on our supermarket shelves from abroad will have been produced to standards that are illegal here. It may make these food items cheaper in some cases, but it’s a false economy given that would undermine our own food security, increase environmental damage and food miles and fail to protect our consumers. As food producers, we are committed to keeping up standards. Our way of producing food in a safe and sustainable way must be protected.” 

It was going to be a day like any other for Esther Howie and her flock of sheep from Anglesey. Until lunch time at least, when she went for her routine check-up on the family Jacob's flock. Something wasn’t as it was supposed to be - the sheep had been badly injured.

The Howie family moved to a holding near Rhosmeirch 7 years ago and have put a lot of time, effort and money into improving and maintaining the land. Both Esther and her husband Neil also work extra jobs to support their life-long dream of having a smallholding. 

Esther already had a flock of pedigree Jacob sheep when they moved to the island and has since added a few Shetland sheep into the mix. Having been busy building up her Jacob flock for over 12 years now, she breeds primarily for wool to support her start-up business Tyddynys. As such, she only lambs a few selected ewes each year, carefully choosing which ewes to put to which ram for improving fleece for the craft industry. 

So it came as a huge shock when she found out that her flock had been attacked by a dog, leaving her devastated and the business hanging in the balance.

Speaking from her holding, she says: “My main holding is on Anglesey, but a while back I was offered a piece of land to graze near Bangor - great piece for my hill sheep, who are really not that impressed with the terrain at home. 

“It’s a good sized piece of land with a nice big shelter. The landlady lives on one side and a friend on the other to keep an eye on the ewes for me when I can’t be there. I moved my Jacob ewes up there for the winter and they were thriving.  

“Until January this year. I went up for my usual visit during my lunch hour at work and noticed that a mule ewe - my landlady’s adopted pet lamb that now lives with us - had fresh blood coming through her fleece.” 

Not sure what had happened but suspecting the sheep had been attacked Esther checked the field. She said: “It looked like one of the lambs had been attacked, but we’ve never had any experience of this to date. 

“The gate into the field is locked and it is the only entrance. The field runs parallel to the A55 so there would be no reason for anyone to be in there. I thought maybe the ewe had been caught in the hedge or fence somewhere and injured herself. I walked the full perimeter of the field checking for fleece in the hedges - knowing that this was going to be unlikely as we had only recently had them cut.” 

About two thirds of her way around she found a large area of grass in the centre of the field that was strewn with clumps of fleece. There was really no mistaking what had happened. 

“I contacted the police and was quite shaken that this could have happened in a seemingly safe and protected area. I had 11 ewes in that field - 4 of them had injuries - significant injuries that I couldn’t treat with a bit of spray alone. 

The Farmers’ Union of Wales is reminding members to follow the latest advice from Public Health Wales and Wales NHS on coronavirus (COVID-19) in order to minimise disease spread and reduce the risk of infection.  

Up-to-date information can be found here:  

https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/coronavirus-covid-19/ 

https://phw.nhs.wales/news/public-health-wales-statement-on-novel-coronavirus-outbreak/

FUW President Glyn Roberts said: “There is a huge amount of misinformation being published online, so it is important that advice from legitimate sources is followed.”  

Mr Roberts’ comments came after Twitter revealed it had recently had to take down a series of posts that were from a fake hospital giving out false advice. 

Some disease experts have suggested we are still to reach the peak season for coronavirus but hope to delay and flatten the peak, which will reduce the pressure on NHS Wales and minimise the impact of the virus.

“Should a member contact coronavirus, or be affected in some other way and there is a subsequent impact on the ability to undertake daily farm business then the FUW can look at this on a case-by-case basis and will provide support where possible,” said Glyn Roberts.

FUW Head of Policy Dr Nick Fenwick added: “We are liaising with the Welsh Government on what changes can be made in order to help the industry to complete and submit their SAF forms this year, during what can only be described as extraordinary circumstances.