Lib Dems on farming post-Brexit, fast-breeding wheat, hare coursing, Scottish silage shortage

Farming Today

• Episode: Lib Dems on farming post-Brexit, fast-breeding wheat, hare coursing, Scottish silage shortage
• Website: Farming Today
• Feed URL: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006qj8q/episodes/downloads.rss
• Duration: 00:13:42
• Published: 2018-01-09 10:57

Lib Dem Tim Farron criticises the Defra secretary's strategy for the future of farming. Michael Gove has defined the current system under the Common Agricultural Policy, as handing out "subsidies for inefficiency". This, says Tim Fallon, is an "insult to British farmers, to call them inefficient." A scientist at the John Innes Centre has started growing plants under LED lights and has discovered he can breed wheat plants in just 8 weeks rather than the usual 5 months. Hare coursing is illegal and has been banned in England, Scotland and Wales since 2004, and in Northern Ireland since 2011. But it's still going on. BBC Radio Lincolnshire's Lucy Parry had special access to the police's Operation Gallileo. Last year was far wetter than normal in parts of south west Scotland, so some farmers were unable to make any of their own fodder, which is unprecedented. Ayrshire dairy, beef and sheep farmer Willie Campbell has had to spend all the farm profits on buying-in imported feed in order to keep his animals alive until spring. Presented by Anna Hill and produced by Beatrice Fenton.