Opinion: Being a farmer has many more upsides than downsides

I’m a first-generation farmer. I chose the job, it didn’t choose me, which in many ways is a very useful thing. Purely through luck, and insatiable curiosity, I spent my 20s doing loads of different things, but it always came back to farming.

I worked around the world, growing (ethical) oil palms in Papua New Guinea and (not terribly ethical) tobacco in Zimbabwe.

I spent two years leading overland trips in South America (fabulous but not a career), went to Sandhurst (gruelling), even worked in a call centre for a week (beyond dire), and had a summer job strimming around discarded items in a motorway service station (which I’ll leave to your imagination). 

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About the author

Sam Walker

Farmers Weekly opinion writer

Sam is a first-generation tenant farmer running a 120ha (300-acre) organic arable and beef farm on the Jurassic Coast of East Devon. He has a BSc from Harper Adams and previous jobs have included farm management in Gloucestershire and Cambridgeshire and overseas development work in Papua New Guinea and Zimbabwe. He is a trustee of FWAG South West and his landlords, Clinton Devon Estate, ran an ELM trial in which he was closely involved, along with fellow tenants.

Read more articles by Sam Walker

But all along it’s been farming that keeps calling me back. For a start, growing food is a useful, even noble, calling.

I have managed farms for other people, and the top tip from a friend was to make sure you make “defensible” decisions.

In other words, if things go wrong and you have to report to a board of directors, make sure you are following standard practices and it really isn’t your fault.

Blame can sometimes be deflected, but ultimately you have to show you have been logical and coherent.

But farming for yourself is even better. You are free to take more risks, follow instincts as well as orthodoxy and, in the main, you only have to defend your decisions to yourself.

Being a farmer also means you can you stay fit without having to go to a gym, and get a tan without having to go on holiday.

Add in very little commuting, your family often around you, dogs at work, and you can get a haircut whenever you like.

And let’s face it, if some catastrophe befell the world and we were all reduced to living in a cave, wondering who to eat next, the farmer would probably be spared as a useful contributor to society. The hedge-fund manager better have his running shoes on…

So, when I lean on a gate looking at happy cows and amazing views of the sea, I can’t really get too worked up about the dreadful state of farm subsidies, the price of red diesel etc.

Of course I have to make it pay as well, and I’ll admit to the odd hour spent lying awake in the middle of the night, thinking about the overdraft.

But many worries are compensated for by a job where every day is different, random cards are thrown down in front of you and you have to keep playing the game as best you can, where the stakes are high and you can achieve big wins and deep lows.

All in all, it has the potential to be utterly compelling.

Sometimes, it is only through the eyes of others that you appreciate what you have got. I have a friend who earns a fortune in the City, but told me the other day that he envies my lifestyle, which makes you think a bit.

We all have a limited number of days to spend on this earth. If nothing else, and I’d rather earn a simple living from a meaningful existence than a fortune from moving other people’s money around, or even from managing someone else’s farming dream. Now I just need to get better at it.