Industry

In a Farming Focus™ bonus episode, Mel Bradley and Ben Mortimer return to the podcast to discuss the main considerations and practical aspects of starting and running a successful farm cluster group, based on their experiences with the Kenn Valley group in Devon.

Overhead power lines (OHPLs) pose a particular risk to farmers when working with high or wide machinery, such as combine harvesters, tipper trucks/trailers, telehandlers and spray booms, and not forgetting radio aerials, flashing beacons and vehicles rolling silage clamps. Other jobs around the farm can also increase the risk, including the use of rain or slurry guns, building temporary stacks of bales, fertiliser, potato boxes or pallets and moving ladders. Serious injuries and fatalities occur from coming into direct contact with live lines but also from being too close to one, causing an electrical discharge known as a ‘flashover’ or ‘arc flash’. Even a jet of water or slurry touching a live line is a danger.

Often thought of as simply ‘shutting the gate’ on a piece of land, farming consultant Jim Bliss explains why rewilding requires an active approach in the UK, while regenerative agronomist Hugo Ellis describes it as driving for balance and diversity in habitats and farm enterprises. And livestock, they say, are essential. On his Nuffield travels, Jim Bliss saw some spectacular examples of what he calls ‘passive’ rewilding, where stock had been removed from the land and nature returned – Patagonia National Park being one. But the UK doesn’t have the space to take this approach. “So, it's much better to have active rewilding, which does involve farming, just in a more nuanced way, where it's all about diversity,” says Jim.

Six agricultural students in the South West have been awarded Cornish Mutual Young Farmer Bursaries. The bursaries offer support for the next generation of farmers and celebrate their enthusiasm for the industry.

Cornish Mutual has been putting farmers and the wider farming community across the South West at the heart of all it does since 1903. And the start of 2025 takes this to a new level.

You and everyone who works for you needs to know how to work safely and without putting themselves at risk. This includes contractors and the self-employed working on your farm. Adequate information and training are essential parts of an employers’ health & safety obligations and should be part of your farm health & safety policy.

Business owners are often encouraged to spend less time in their business and more time on it to realise its full potential and see it grow but struggle do it. Both involved with ‘all things people’, Nuffield scholars Anna Bowen and Izak van Heerden discuss how to make it happen through good leadership. Prioritising time to focus on strategy rather than remaining stuck in the immediate day-to-day demands of farming is not easy to do but essential for business success according to Izak van Heerden.

There are two sets of legislation covering farm machinery and equipment, namely the Lifting Operations and Lifting Equipment Regulations 1998 (LOLER) and the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998 (PUWER).