Memorandum submitted by Stuart Davenport
(RAS 18)
1. As a younger (aged 20) individual who
is presently struggling to follow in the footsteps of my father,
who farms 350 acres cereals, 100 acres potatoes and lambs 400
ewes in Warwickshire (not 20 minutes from the NAC Stoneleigh ground)
I would appreciate a chance to debate the CAP and its associated
reforms with the DEFRA select committee.
2. No industry can cope in a situation as
unstable as that which the CAP fudge has left farming. Long term
planning, both financial and farming, needs to be carried out
with a settled situation, not one in a constant state of flux.
3. The situation currently facing Europe,
and indeed the world, is incomparable to that when the CAP was
first developed. Movement to a global farming marketplace is certainly
the thinking I would hope the committee is adopting.
4. However for this to work the industry
needs to ask the following political questions:
(a) How can agreement be reached with other
EU countries and major powers (eg. the USA) to open up the marketplace?
(b) How can current WTO rules relating to
the imposition of unequal quality and environmental expectations
between imported and endogenous products be circumvented to ensure
that a "world standard" is developed?
(c) How can the transition from protected
production to the global marketplace be made as pain free as possible?
5. I have ideas on the answers to my points
raised but would sincerely relish the prospect of hearing from,
and probing at, a group of MPs whose ideas and opinion are respected
by Ministers and the Governmental system. My hope is that the
committee is willing to hear from younger members of the industry
rather than a homogenous group of the more dyed in the wool members
who often already have a greater access to the axis of power in
the farming world.
June 2006
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