The Farmers Fight

Ilovecheese and Maizie have risen key questions as in the price of land and therefore the viability of small farms, squeezed by the pushes to find food at ever lower prices.

Googled rise in land prices:

Limited supply
The UK has a limited amount of farmland, and it's slowly being developed as urban areas expand.

Strong demand
There's strong demand from a wide variety of buyers, including those looking for natural investment capital or for environmental purposes.

Inflation
Farmland is considered a safe store of real value compared to other investment types during periods of inflation.

Government funding
There's increased government funding for environmental land management programs.

Environmental initiatives
Biodiversity and climate initiatives are upholding investor interest in farmland.

War in Ukraine and supply chain issues
The war in Ukraine and ongoing supply chain issues resulting from the pandemic have caused prices to rise.

You can see that 2 of them definitely relate to "buying land as safer investment" - but not of course necessarily farming it.

Not quite sure what can be done.

Hopefully IT will reduce the appeal "buy to invest/tax avoid" only purchasers but whether a government can decide which land should be protected or re-evaluated for "farmers only" is a moot point, who decides?

Small farmers who decide to sell of part of their land or the whole property to raise capital or retire would strongly object if they cant get what is currently full market value.

Small farmers who decide to sell of part of their land or the whole property to raise capital or retire would strongly object if they cant get what is currently full market value.

'Aye. There's the rub' (W. Shakespeare)

Small farmers who decide to sell of part off their land or the whole property to raise capital or retire would strongly object if they can't get what is currently full marketvalue.
But mostly they want to pass it on lock, stock and barrel to their heirs and not sell anyway.

You raise an interesting point about revaluations to suit ilovecheese. I'm not sure how it works for farms, but I've done it with one of my parents' properties for probate purposes and to avoid IHT.
I had to get what was called a Red Book valuation by I think 2 or 3 qualified sureyors. You can help alter the figures a bit, but you can't decide on and submit the value yourself. It needs to be able to withstand any scrutiny of course.
Probably even more complicated for farms.

Sarnia

Infuriated farmers will be protesting against Labour's 'Tractor Tax' opposite Downing Street tomorrow. They are being asked not to bring farm machinery but I hope they clutter up Whitehall with every tractor and combine harvester they can lay their hands on. Reeves claims 'only' 20% of farms will be affected by her latest smash and grab raid but economists say it is nearer 70%. Has it not figured in her brain that if farmers, who already struggle to make ends meet, chuck in the towel, there will be a serious food shortage?

To address the O/P after all the discussions on here: not, there will not be a serious food shortage as long as farmland is farmed

not bought for purely investment/hobby farming, but the future will mean more larger farms because of the price squeeze except for small farms which successfully diversify and find specialist markets.

So food production will drop if investment buyers don't farm viable farmland, and it will be a positive move to tax them and discourage, as its party those people who have put land prices up.
I'm definitely in favour of reviewing the "cut off points" for IT but tbh I don't see it as changing a long term trend for large units.

A question - do smaller farms not get the benefit of environmental grants - because they should - or is it just large units able to gain from this?

Surely small farmers will not be asked to pay inheritance tax.

Our farms only produce 60% of our food and have to import 40%. The majority of which is vegetables.
Why on earth are we not self sufficient in vegetables?

silverlining48

Our farms only produce 60% of our food and have to import 40%. The majority of which is vegetables.
Why on earth are we not self sufficient in vegetables?

Because people now demand salad vegetables and strawberries in the middle of winter.
They demand avocados instead of swede.

When a Minister suggested people eat swede and carrots instead of avocados or similar, there was an outcry on GN suggesting how patronising that was.

We should be eating seasonally, as we always did and
Strawberries are tasteless in winter.
I couldn’t find parsnips last week. Not sure why. They are or should be home grown.

silverlining48

We should be eating seasonally, as we always did and
Strawberries are tasteless in winter.
I couldn’t find parsnips last week. Not sure why. They are or should be home grown.

Aldi’s and M & S have parsnips.

Out of interest wonder how ‘ they’ know what consumers demand? I have never been asked and I have done the shopping for nearly 60 years.

silverlining48

We should be eating seasonally, as we always did and
Strawberries are tasteless in winter.
I couldn’t find parsnips last week. Not sure why. They are or should be home grown.

Tesco had lovely parsnips last week.
And swede
And carrots

I was in Aldi, GG, no parsnips last week, I had to do without.

I got a swede and carrots, cauliflour too. But no parsnips which I needed for my lovely lentil stew.

Well, we ate all ours (roasted) or else I could post you some!

ps they freeze - I cut them into a suitable size for roasting, put them in a bag with some oil then freeze.

silverlining48

I was in Aldi, GG, no parsnips last week, I had to do without.

Perhaps it’s a regional thing 🤷‍♀️

Allira

ps they freeze - I cut them into a suitable size for roasting, put them in a bag with some oil then freeze.

I parboil my parsnips, freeze them on trays, when totally frozen transfer into freezer bags.

The nice straight ones are ready for Christmas, the wonky ones will be used when we fancy with roasts.

I parboil my parsnips
Sorry - forgot that bit! I steam them then freeze with some oil.

Allira

^I parboil my parsnips^
Sorry - forgot that bit! I steam them then freeze with some oil.

Next time I will try adding some oil 👍

It stops them sticking together (well, mostly), GrannyGravy, then they are ready to throw into a roasting tin!

'Through the hoo-ha over farmer’s inheritance tax (IHT), here is what you need to know…
“A third of all farmland in the UK is farmed by tenant farmers like my friend (and everybody he knows around here), who'll be completely unaffected by the IHT changes.
“So who will be affected by the IHT changes? From April 2026, taxes will apply to agricultural assets over £1 million (or up to £3 million in certain circumstances). Here's an explainer:
lordslibrary.parliament.uk/budget-2024.../
“Three things are worth noting: Firstly, any transfer of assets more than seven years before death is outside the scope of IHT. Secondly, the tax isn't a one-off sum - it's payable over a 10 year period, interest free.
“And this third point is very significant: we have evidence the rich are deliberately investing their money in land to avoid paying IHT. Jeremy Clarkson himself admitted that was why he bought so much land in an interview with the Times back in 2021.
“How big a problem is this? Well, almost half of all farms have less than 20 hectares of land. Incredibly, though, the average UK farm is 82 hectares - a staggeringly high sum that indicates how much land is owned by a minority.
“To give a sense of comparison? Jeremy Clarkson purchased a whopping 400 hectares (20 times the average farm size) back in 2008. So whatever you do, don't think he's the average farmer; he really isn't.
“Want to get a sense of how things are getting worse? According to property consultants Strutt & Parker, non-farmers were responsible for less than a third of farmland purchases in 2010... but this had risen to 56% by last year.
“In the last year alone, 400,000 hectares of agricultural land have been taken out of use for farming, as the wealthiest purchase land. Doing so allows them to avoid IHT.
“Traditionally, IHT hasn't been applied to farmland to avoid the breakup of family farms. Now, though, that's working against the country; the wealthy are purchasing vast tracts of land that avoids paying IHT.
“You know what happens in that scenario? The family farms that we're talking about trying to protect... are gone. If you want to talk about food security, the reality is that things are getting worse.
“Looking at this, there seems a strong case for IHT reform. The current situation is both unsustainable and deeply problematic, leading to an outcome we desperately want to avoid - where the wealthy own almost all the land and family farms are dying.
“This, of course, is NOT the discussion that's happening in the media. Why not? Well, partly because a lot of famous, wealthy, and vocal people WILL be affected by the change to IHT (Jeremy Clarkson, Lloyd Webber, etc).
“Ten landowners - just ten! - own one sixth of Dorset. They include Jonathan Harmsworth... whose family own the Daily Mail. Are alarm bells beginning to ring over the way this debate's being framed?
We have a romanticized vision of how country life works. The problem is the mental image most people have of farming... is out of date'.
From an article I've just read on facebook. Apologies for not having the source to hand [I'll try to find it] but I would imagine the figures are correct.

Where were they when I paid IHT on Dad's bungalow and savings (was a teacher who lived cheap all his life)? They were happy, exempt and savvy!! Even now hardly any will pay, those who do will pay at half rate AND get 10 years to do it - I had to pay Before probate could be given.

Thanks Maybe. Interesting reading.

Thank you MayBee .

MayBee🙏