Clarkson swaps cars for crops in new TV series

Petrolhead TV presenter Jeremy Clarkson will ditch cars for crops in a new series about his passion for farming.

The former Top Gear presenter, 59, lives on a 404ha (1,000-acre) farm in Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire, where he grows wheat, barley and oilseed rape.

Filming has begun for the new series, I bought the farm, which will be aired in September on Amazon Prime.

See also: Jeremy Clarkson on his own farm, red tape, sheep and sheds

In an interview with the Sunday Times, Mr Clarkson said the show will be more hard-hitting than Countryfile and document the realities of farming, such as dealing with extreme weather, pest and disease pressure and paperwork.

“This is not Kate Humble – much as I like Kate Humble – with 20 acres, bottle-feeding a lamb. Or a TV presenter who grows veg in his back garden. This is actual farming: Life, death and form-filling,” he said.

“We’re not making Countryfile. We’ll be showing it warts and all. For example, I have no view on badger culling in terms of whether it’s necessary, but if it’s happening we will not shy away from putting it in the programme.”

Daily struggles

The series will highlight the difficulties farmers face on a daily basis in their efforts to increase food production for a burgeoning population, while protecting the environment.

“When you till the soil or plough in weeds, it releases carbon into the atmosphere. So you think ‘OK, I won’t plough, I’ll just spray the weeds.’ But that’s bad for the bees,” said Mr Clarkson.

“Every decision you make as a farmer is bad for some reason or another.”

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This year, his fields were infested with blackgrass and his oilseed rape was damaged by flea beetle. His grain became contaminated with gravel when he tried to store it on an old airfield.

And when he tried to take some of his land out of stewardship and put it into to production, the civil servants refused him permission.

“I take the global view that the bigger the world’s population gets, the more food we’re going to need. So it’s slightly mad not to increase crop production because there’s a rare grass growing,” he explained.

Food crisis

Mr Clarkson will also voice his fears about a looming food shortage.

“Scientists calculate that we have just 90 years before we run out of food, because of soil depletion,” he said. “That’s just 90 more harvests.”

Mr Clarkson also admitted to changing his own diet, eating less red meat and more vegetables. “I do eat chicken,” he said. “But that’s just a vegetable with a head.”