Diary of an Organic Dairy Converter by Neil Jeffrey (Courtesy of Farmers Weekly)
Instalment 1 - Making the decision
As this is the first diary entry I thought I’d start with who we all are. There’s Harold, Denise (Dad and Mum) and Neil (me) all working in partnership together on Glebe Farm near Newquay.
Mum and Dad moved from West Cornwall in the early seventies taking on a 100 acre rented mixed dairy farm. This gradually expanded so that when I returned home, having studied, and worked as an engineer, it had grown to 300 acres. It comprised of 90 milking cows, 30 beef animals and 100 acres of cereals.
By spring 2006 we were farming 400 acres, 350 of which was productive farmland, the rest wet woodland and summer young stock grazing. We were milking 150 cows, with 200 followers, growing 20 acres of whole crop wheat and 60 acres of maize and were on the brink of expanding to 250 autumn calving cows. We were asking ourselves many questions and the one tricky one to answer was where would we be left if the current downward trend in milk price continued? If we expanded we may find ourselves working harder for the same money with greater risk.
We discussed the marketplace with feed firms, agronomists and the Organic Milk Cooperative (OMSCo), to understand the demand for organic milk now and in the future. Maybe we could in the long term receive more for our milk with lower costs.
Our research showed us that if we went this way we would be able to reduce the costs of purchasing inputs such as fertilisers and sprays immediately. My main concern was how we could grow enough forage to support our animals during the conversion as well as the scarcity and rising price of organic seed and feed. This meant during the conversion process we would need to cull cows from the milking herd and sell some of the replacements.
Converting to organic would mean a smaller income initially but a lot less investment than expanding the current herd. The sale of the cows and heifers would offset any loss in production during conversion. Also by maintaining cow numbers more time can be spent with the family. So the decision was made and we chose the Soil Association as our certification body and we joined OMSCo as it ensures a controlled recruitment of new farmers as the market allows.
Next month – the first steps in the conversion process
The First Steps in the Conversion Process by Neil Jeffrey (courtesy of Farmers Weekly)
Having made the monumental decision to turn our much-loved farm and family business into an organic dairy farm, we began to take our first shaky steps on the long road ahead.
After reseeding around 15% of the farm to a red clover, white clover and grass mix, we applied for a conversion start date of October 2006.
The next stage was to apply for Defra’s Organic Entry Level Stewardship (OELS) which is available to both existing organic farmers and producers entering land into conversion. Providing you achieve a certain number of points, you can benefit from payments made by the Rural Payments Agency in recognition of the changes required to enter conversion.
To apply for the OELS, we had to first contact a certified organic inspection body (we chose the Soil Association) who came out and inspected our land. We also had to contact the Rural Land Register to check our land was registered with them. Once these processes were in place, we got in touch with Natural England as their Crewe office handles the OELS applications and sent out all the relevant forms and maps that we needed to complete and send back for authorisation. The Farming and Wildlife Advisory Group (FWAG) were a great help in helped guiding us through it all. The process was a lengthy one with lots of form-filling but was definitely worth doing.
To help us on our way, OMSCo held a very useful series of workshops for farmers converting to organic dairying and we were invited to come along and discuss our challenges and draw up strategies to manage the conversion process. Incorporating all aspects of the organic farming system, they covered diverse topics such as herd health, slurry and forage management.
Dad attended these and, amongst other things, learnt that good record-keeping is a real priority for converting farmers. Keeping really comprehensive records on our farm has meant we were able to prove that we had not used any sprays or fertilizers on some of the ground for up to 4 months. This should help us in our quest to have some of the farm fully organic from June 2008.
Apart from having to tighten our belts a little during the initial period, the conversion process is going well so far. We had a slight mishap when some of the grass seed was attacked by slugs but at least it meant we learnt our first lesson which was that we should flat roll the field until we can ride a push-bike across it without leaving a mark!
Next time… living without fertiliser, cropping and grazing.
The First Steps in the Conversion Process by Neil Jeffrey (courtesy of Farmers Weekly)