Shropshire Magazine

Shropshire NFU members travelled to Holland on what is believed to be the county’s first overseas trip viewing crop and livestock production. It was organised by one Captain Foster.

Nathan Rous discovers that, as the National Farmers’ Union celebrates its centenary, the problems the industry faces are really nothing new – and there is plenty of optimism for the future

In the last 100 years farming has changed immeasurably: from rudimentary plough to monster machine, and from vast numbers of men and horses working 500 acres to three men on tractors covering twice that area.

With it the landscape has changed, too. In the early 1900s there were 30 million acres of agricultural land in Britain, half of which was under the plough. Today’s countryside is a very different beast, with towns encroaching from all sides and roads scything into the heart of field and meadow.

But throughout this period there has been one constant: the problems have stayed the same for an industry in almost continual turmoil.

As the National Farmers’ Union celebrates its centenary this year, a look back to 1908 reveals that farmers were dogged then by legislation, disease and reform as much as they are today.

Indeed, as farmers from all corners of England and Wales united to give the industry some much-needed political firepower, their main aim was to fight the spread of disease from foreign livestock and tackle the preferential rates given to imported produce.

But it’s the NFU’s origins, and Shropshire’s vital role in its foundation, which give the county most cheer as the centenary celebrations loom large.

While disputed facts and false claims are as much a part of history as the true facts themselves, Shropshire cannot say it was the seat of the NFU. That honour falls to Lincolnshire, and in particular to farmer Colin Campbell who went on to become the first ever president of the union.

Yet Shropshire was most certainly knee-deep in the movement’s foundations, says Guy Smith, who has just published a history of the NFU.

It centred around a row which erupted in the middle of 1908 between farmers and butchers. Huge strides had been made in eradicating bovine tuberculosis and establishing higher standards of hygiene in the fresh-meat trade, but the butchers wanted a warranty of health for all cattle sold which placed the risk back with the farmer.

Not surprisingly, cattle farmers were less than enthusiastic about the proposal.

Guy explains: “Things came to a head on a morning in August 1908 at the cattle market in Wellington. The auctioneers sided with the farmers and called a meeting at which butchers’ demands were to be met with the cry of ‘No warranty!’.”

Adrian Joynt, chairman of Shropshire NFU, says that the key to farming’s future is improved efficiency in producing food and fuel.

Crusade

“At a bigger meeting called at Shrewsbury Corn Exchange the following month a new association of Shrewsbury and District Farmers was formed. Some of the local Shropshire men were familiar with Colin Campbell’s crusade to form a national union and invited him to speak to a further assembly on November 3. Campbell accepted the offer and used the occasion to demonstrate how only through united action could farmers hope to take on the likes of the butchers and resist their demands.

“By great good fortune, not long after Campbell had sat down, a telegram arrived from London to announce that the butchers had capitulated.

“The Shrewsbury association promptly became a Shropshire Farmers’ Union and sought to work with the Lincolnshire men. There was now an impetus among the fragmented farmers’ unions across the country to seek a national entity.”

Joy Fox is writing a book, too, although hers centres on the direct origins of Shropshire NFU.

She explains: “The ambition of the book is to give an easily pieced together jigsaw of the formation and the development of the NFU in Shropshire.

“It is to provide ‘snippets and snapshots’ of the political scene through depression, the two World Wars, peace-time guaranteed prices, entry into the EU with food mountains and milk lakes, the three-day week, Thatcher, and BSE, and how all these affected individual Shropshire farming families. Some rippled through and others ripped life and countryside apart.

“The rules of Shropshire’s farming have changed to reflect the challenges. Time was when food was needed at all cost. That was a time when rabbits, shot on the railway line, were gratefully purchased.

Grapple

“We have seen an era of utter contempt and revulsion that farmers should use chemical sprays and hormones, while Shropshire farmers and politicians grapple with issues revolving around biofuels.

“What goes around comes around: walk into any of Shropshire’s market towns on market day in 1908 and virtually all produce would be local. In the 21st century it’s farmers markets, food miles and ‘buy local’. Pure food and pure beer was an issue in 1910; today we wonder what goes into many mass-produced foodstuffs.

“As a first-generation Shropshire farmer’s daughter of the 1960s, it has been an illuminating journey to trace the cart track of the county’s NFU members and their farming families as they tread the Shropshire Way.”

Oliver Cartwright, part of the NFU team at the regional headquarters in Telford, said there was plenty of room for optimism in the future.

“We are thrilled that this is our centenary year and, while many other industries have declined, farming and the NFU are both going strong. We hope this will continue for another century and beyond.

“The NFU in Shropshire and across the country has helped to unite the farming industry, lobbied decision-makers with a single, strong voice, and dealt with huge obstacles in times of crisis. We couldn’t do it without our members who should feel rightly proud about the centenary. “While we can look back and celebrate the last century of achievement we still need to plan for what is ahead and ensure that farming across the country and in Shropshire plays its part when it comes to tackling important future issues including rising world food demand, climate change and energy security.

“Here is to the next 100 years: happy birthday NFU.”

But where exactly does it go in the next 100 years?

Farming has no doubt changed beyond all recognition since those trying times at the Shrewsbury Corn Exchange but, with climate change and global demand for food placing untold pressures on our army of producers, can they really survive the next century?

Adrian Joynt is chairman of Shropshire NFU in its centenary year and also farm manager at Walford College.

He points out that the demands will be greater but the rewards even more so if farmers can rise to the challenge.

“The two F-words, food and fuel, are becoming increasingly important and farmers will be the drivers behind the production of both in the future,” Adrian says confidently.

“With the world’s population projected to expand rapidly in the next 40 years, increasing urbanisation will mean that more food will have to be produced from a smaller area of land.

“GM technology will play a big part in this, whether it is to produce crops that are resistant to disease; or to increase yields from less fertiliser by using crops that fix their nitrogen requirement from the atmosphere; or simply to reduce the amount of pesticides that are used with the use of herbicide tolerant varieties.

“The use of GPS systems in agriculture will become more widespread, increasing the accuracy of input applications and therefore increasing production efficiency for food and fuel. With it, the workforce will have to become even more skilled to operate the machinery of the future as it increases in complexity.

“More energy will be provided from animal wastes and fuel will be created from parts of plants that currently have little or no value.

“In my mind there is no doubt that the future of farming is a prosperous one. There will always be the weather factor, but with a generally increasing awareness of the quality of the food produced by British farmers, and the tourism and leisure benefits created from the landscape the industry produces, there will always be need for the UK’s farmers.”

Neale Sadler and his father farm at Quina Brook, near Wem. They are pictured with Neale’s two-year-old son William.

Neale Sadler, who farms at Quina Brook near Wem, is certainly aware of the new techniques moving the farming operation forward into the next century, having installed a robotic milking parlour two years ago.

The first in the county, Neale says others are now hot on his heels.

“I suppose there always has to be someone to try it out and work through the problems, but once everyone else sees how revolutionary it can be they are never far behind,” he says matter-of-factly.

“Farming has changed and continues to do so. A lot of it is about investment but a good farming operation will always find ways to survive.”