It has not been a great start to the year for farmers, and not only in South Africa.
Apart from their inflation and interest rate woes, farmers in Europe and the UK are angry with their governments about a rash of new environmental regulations affecting their operations, increased taxes, subsidy cuts and bans on pesticides.
British farmers and their families are in a state of deep depression about the future. A recent article in the Guardian newspaper, headlined ‘Farming is a dirty word now’, makes for disturbing reading. (shorturl.at/QSY19).
They’ve adopted some of the more tame methods, pioneered by South Africans, to express their displeasure with government: marching to government offices (with their cows, in the case of Irish farmers), blocking roads and dumping manure on the city streets. (They’ve still some way to go to match our standard toyi-toying, violence and destruction of property!)
COMMON PROBLEMS
Our farmers share all these problems, with a few others thrown in that pose infinitely more serious shortterm threats to their businesses, such as electricity blackouts, poor road, rail and port services, and a lack of maintenance of law and order.
However, South Africa’s farmers are a tough bunch, and have shown themselves highly resilient to adversity. While there is anger and frustration, I have yet to see any of the deep depression that seems to be taking hold among farmers in Britain.
As for spending time and effort protesting against government inefficiency and corruption by blocking roads and dumping manure on the streets, they’re all far too busy solving their problems and ‘state-proofing’ their businesses!
This story is from the February 16, 2024 edition of Farmer's Weekly.
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This story is from the February 16, 2024 edition of Farmer's Weekly.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
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