I run The Oak Tree Low Carbon Farm here in the UK. 12 acres of formely severely degraded land (the normal result of industrial agriculture) which is now run as a community supported agriculture scheme with members of the local community helping with work on the farm and sharing the harvest.
It is incredibly tough to compete with industrial agriculture. Regulations in the UK make small scale meat production virtually impossible, other regulations make it virtually illegal to feed waste food from the nearby town to our pigs and chickens (which smallholders have done for millenia). Further regulations, and pressure on land prices due to development make it almost impossible to get the basic building infrastructure we need... add to that the fact it is too much paperwork and hassle to get the negligable CAP subsidies that our large scale competitors get in vast amounts. We wouldn't be eligable for environmental CAP payments anyway as we don't "tick the boxes" - despite this we have seen a huge increase in the biodiversity in the farm. What has it taken to keep going? One hell of a lot of determination from individuals who actually want to see the changes that the reports talk about it, and some generous financial help from private organisations. The agro industry lobby is incredibly strong - it isn't in their interests to see us as anything other than marginal.
I run The Oak Tree Low Carbon Farm here in the UK. 12 acres of formely severely degraded land (the normal result of industrial agriculture) which is now run as a community supported agriculture scheme with members of the local community helping with work on the farm and sharing the harvest.
It is incredibly tough to compete with industrial agriculture. Regulations in the UK make small scale meat production virtually impossible, other regulations make it virtually illegal to feed waste food from the nearby town to our pigs and chickens (which smallholders have done for millenia). Further regulations, and pressure on land prices due to development make it almost impossible to get the basic building infrastructure we need... add to that the fact it is too much paperwork and hassle to get the negligable CAP subsidies that our large scale competitors get in vast amounts. We wouldn't be eligable for environmental CAP payments anyway as we don't "tick the boxes" - despite this we have seen a huge increase in the biodiversity in the farm. What has it taken to keep going? One hell of a lot of determination from individuals who actually want to see the changes that the reports talk about it, and some generous financial help from private organisations. The agro industry lobby is incredibly strong - it isn't in their interests to see us as anything other than marginal.