Originally from: PoppaC
                        
http://icteesside.icnetwork.co.uk/0400business/northernfarming/content_objectid=13973950_method=full_siteid=50081_headline=-Importance-of-looking-after-the-land-name_page.html

Importance of looking after the land
Feb 21 2004

By Carl Hudspith, The Journal

I have to wonder why the image of farmers is so often depicted unfavourably by the media at times.

By their nature, farmers are not always the best communicators. After all, a lot of them do have to work on their own and this does not give them the opportunity to explain many of the false accusations made against them. Having said that about farmers, I bet other occupations, such as police officers and teachers, feel that the media is also against them.

We have to accept that the media thrive on tragedy, crime, scare-mongering and of course sex. We live in an age of the mass media where the public gets most of their information from the newspapers, broadcasting and the internet. There are pressure groups with their own agendas who use these various methods of communication to spread false facts about agriculture.

This is a small attempt to put the record straight, but many readers will no doubt say – well he would say that wouldn't he?

Farmers are accused of abusing the countryside by ripping out hedges for example. However, during the last 10 years over 13,000 miles of grass margins (grassed areas around the outside of fields which remain uncropped allowing wildlife to prosper) have been established and almost 9,000 miles of hedgerows have been restored or planted, plus the restoration of 1,000 miles of dry stone walling.

Farmers have planted more than 87 million trees and in doing so have doubled the woodland cover in England and Wales from what it was in 1920 and five per cent more than in 1990.

In 2001, the British Trust for Ornithology reported large increases in a number of species of farm and woodland birds and there has also been a welcome improvement in the biological quality of rivers and streams and their habitat corridors.

Our farmers, although few in number, look after a large percentage of Britain's land surface area. With the current trend, the skills of land management are disappearing with the farmers and farm workers.

I have seen the surprise in the eyes of new non-farmer landowners when they are advised of the need to maintain drains, ditches and hedges. They suddenly realise that being a landowner means ongoing maintenance work that doesn't come cheap.

There is ample evidence around us to see that this maintenance is not being done, either by non-farmers who do not regard it as important or are unaware of the necessity, and also by the farmers who no longer have the profit to spend on such things.

Take a closer look the next time you drive in the countryside. Look at the field gates (an old saying was that you could judge a farmer by his gates), the increasing amount of ragwort and other weeds and the numerous farm buildings that are now not used for agriculture. This lack of maintenance will inevitably have repercussions on the ability of UK agriculture to feed the nation. You might say – so what, if the food is in the shops why worry? Well, nature can create all sorts of problems which undermine the food supply. Add to that the possibility of terrorist activity and global warming, and the potential for food shortage is clear. With all these possibilities there has to be some safety margins and one of them is to ensure that home food production does not continue its current decline.

* Carl Hudspith is the NFU's North-West's public relations officer.

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Hi All

<snip>

I have seen the surprise in the eyes of new non-farmer landowners when they are advised of the need to maintain drains, ditches and hedges. They suddenly realise that being a landowner means ongoing maintenance work that doesn't come cheap.

<end_snip>

I think this article and this snippet underline the argument put forward in recent posts in Farmtalking.

Hoo Roo

Norm