Opinion: Focus on your business, not trying to change policy
© Adobe Stock Are you familiar with the seven stages of grief – the phases that a human goes through when they are adjusting to a sudden loss or very bad news?
The process is shock, denial, anger, bargaining, depression, testing then acceptance.
Have a think about which stage you are at on this journey with regard to all the government’s recent changes that affect us.
See also: Farmers Weekly Podcast Ep 245: Options for farmers locked out of SFI
Farmers driving their combines around Parliament Square appear to be going around in circles in the anger phase.
When the farming unions met with the Treasury to suggest alternative ways of raising taxes, it looked a lot like the bargaining stage.
About the author
And we all know farming folk permanently stuck in the depression zone who are tragically unable to make their peace with reality.
Me? I’ve had all these emotions now and finished the course. I’ve reached acceptance.
I’m sitting here crossed-legged and serene like Buddha – I’ve already got the haircut. You can hear me chanting: “We are at a time of huge changes so we must boldly look forwards.”
The situation with inheritance tax and the Sustainable Farming Incentive is unfair and unpleasant, but let’s be pragmatic.
The public purse is empty, so government spending will fall and taxes will rise. It is unlikely that campaigning for the government to reverse its ideas is the best long-term solution for any of our individual businesses; it is almost certainly better to make plans that aren’t based on the whims of elected politicians.
Our current issues are a predictable and, perhaps, necessary evolution of Brexit – the move to a non-EU model for the UK countryside.
The situation we now find ourselves in has some parallels with New Zealand in 1984 when a new Labour government, dealing with high inflation and high state borrowing, slashed farm subsidies overnight.
There was a very painful readjustment. Land prices fell, fertiliser use dropped by 60%, sheep numbers nearly halved. But those resilient Kiwis restructured and engaged with their markets.
By 1995 their land values were nearly back at pre-reform levels. By 2005, their livestock industry had gone from being the worst to the second-most efficient in the world.
The comparison isn’t an exact one. New Zealand was able to greatly devalue its currency and they hadn’t just had a stonking great row with their nearest trading partner, but it illustrates how systemic change brings creativity and a ditching of bad habits.
Obviously UK farmers need and deserve better profits than they are getting right now. The reduction of indirect subsidies could actually help here. Input suppliers are going to lose business if they don’t lower their prices.
Our customers are going to lose supply if they don’t start paying fair prices on quick payment terms. I predict this will happen. Ultimately, though, it isn’t up to these people to steer our businesses for us.
The farmers who will have great enterprises in 20 years’ time aren’t blockading traffic or trying to change government policy today.
These farmers are already busy learning about their customers and measuring how they compare with their competitors. They will have a forensic understanding of their costs, they will know what makes their product stand out, and they will be trying to find efficiency.
Change is tough, but the alternative is worse – and our individual survival is completely optional.