Memorandum submitted by Tom Meikle
1. What are the
non-market benefits of protection for sugar providers for the
EU as a whole?
I can only speak about the environmental impact
of sugar beet in the UK. As a farmer who has grown it for many
years and has a keen interest in conservation, (NFU and English
Nature Farming for Wildlife winner 2004 and Silver Lapwing runner
up in England 2004), I can say the environmental benefits
are vast.
— Birds find sugar beet a very
attractive crop; Sugar beet is planted in March- April time, this
allows over wintered stubbles to be left on light land before
planting; this benefits all farmland birds.
— Our sugar beet has no insecticide
other than a seed dressing; optimum herbicide usage allows enough
weed numbers to provide seed for chicks and birds right through
to the end of January; Only 1 dose of fungicide and small amounts
of nitrogen are applied (over application of nitrogen will increase
impurities in sugar and decrease sugar content); All make it a
very environmental friendly crop to grow.
— Because 50% of the crop is harvested
after Christmas, the following crops are often set-aside or a
spring cereal; therefore sugar beet provides benefits for three
years form just one crop. Sugar beet is grown on our farm on a
rotation of one in three years; so you can see that if it was
removed form the rotation it would have a major impact. We have
a healthy population of corn buntings and skylarks and also have
lapwings, grey partridge and turtledoves—all species in
decline.
— Small mammals like field voles
and field mice also find sugar beet an attractive crop and so
in turn, it provides good hunting ground for barn owls, kestrels
and buzzards. The Barn Owl Trust says sugar beet is their favourite
crop.
2. The extent and timescale of the proposed
price reductions
At present, it costs between £16 and £19
per tonne to grow sugar beet; with the proposed cuts, the price
could drop as low as £17/tonne which would make it unprofitable
to grow. It is assumed by some that if the price does not fall
as low as this and stays up in the low £20s, it will be more
profitable than break crops like oil seed rape, beans etc. But
sugar beet is not a break crop; it is a cash crop because there
is a yield reduction in the following crop unlike beans, oilseed
rape and peas which enhance the yield potential of the next crop.
This is partly because of the late harvest and the impact of the
large harvest machinery used in winter conditions.
My farm is reliant on sugar beet for a large
part of its profit; the cost of growing it has already been cut
to a minimum and I expect to see costs increasing over the next
few years; increases in the price of oil will have a significant
impact on the cost of inputs, contractors and haulage.
Sugar beet is too important a crop to drop before
the full details of the EU proposals are finalised. It should
be from that date that a suitable period of adjustment should
be given, not before.
3. Implication for UK agriculture—alternative
land use
Alternative crops would probably be wheat or
oil seed rape. Growing these crops on a farm of our acreage would
make the farm unprofitable. It would need considerable investment
in machinery or becoming even more reliant on contractors. This
would in turn mean looking for alternative income which has implications
for tax, agricultural relief etc as well as reducing the time
needed for farm maintenance and conservation work.
If sugar beet acreage drops, the beet factories
will become unviable in certain parts of the country. This in
turn will make it unprofitable to grow in certain areas because
of the increase in haulage costs.
4. Proposed arrangements for compensation
Compensation for sugar beet growers for loss
of earnings etc should go to sugar beet growers. This would enable
beet growers to continue growing this valuable crop and in turn
allow contractors who are not growers but have invested large
amounts of money in machinery to continue (eg £300,000 for
a new harvester). Giving the compensation allocated to sugar beet
growers to all farmers would not make it compensation for loss
of income or investment in machinery. It becomes almost irrelevant.
Single Farm Payments on sugar beet ground is not compensation
when you consider that vegetable growers, who received no aid
in the past, will get Single Farm Payments as well as the extra
sugar beet growers' compensation, if the present proposals are
implemented.
Going from sugar beet into vegetable production
could mean loosing Single Farm Payments because authorisation
will not have been allocated, putting beet growers at a disadvantage
to vegetable growers.
Tom Meikle
Sugar Beet Grower
September 2005
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