Simon Smith interviewed by Ian Reynolds 10 December 2018
I was born in North Tees Hospital in 1972. My parents lived in this house, I was raised in this house and I have now moved back into this house. I didn’t go to school in the village, I went to school in Stockton, to the local Catholic school. I continued my education through the Catholic state school system. I went on through university and did a degree in agricultural biochemistry and nutrition, and eventually ended up back on the farm 18 years ago. At university I wanted to diversify slightly from agriculture. Obviously with an interest in agriculture but ultimately my wish was to come back to the farm and I’ve been lucky enough to be able to do it.
I have two brothers and a sister. They have all moved away from the farm. My sister is a doctor, I have one brother who is an engineer and my eldest brother has maintained links to agriculture. He runs a business, the core of the business is producing livestock feed supplements. He has kept a closer link to agriculture. But none of them have chosen to take up farming.
As a farmer you do everything. As someone said to me the other day, a farmer has to be as comfortable unblocking a drain as he is talking to a lawyer! That about sums it up.
We currently grow arable crops, the main crop being wheat. Also, barley, oil seed rape, oats, beans and we grow grass for livestock, for silage and grazing. We rear cattle and sheep and we also keep chickens. So, we’re fairly diverse by modern farming systems. I’m spread on four sites. The reason being as businesses need to expand to maintain viability, we’re very restricted here. There is no further farmland, as you’re well aware. We are geographically constrained by the River Tees and the amount of housing on all sides. So, if I want more land I have to go and find it elsewhere. The furthest piece of land I currently farm is about eight miles away. But everything is within that radius. It’s all within half an hour on a tractor, depending on traffic going through Yarm.
So, with the livestock I try and feed on a home-produce basis. The livestock reared by me is reared and fed almost exclusively by ourselves. There are other grains going to different markets. Wheat has become a fairly diverse range. What I produce, historically went into livestock feed, into flour mills for biscuit-type flours. The kind of wheat I produce is generally quite popular on the continent for making bread, French and Spanish style bread. So, a lot of that used to be exported to Europe, in particular into Spain. Quite a lot of it used to go into Scotland for distilling into whisky. Now, probably the bulk of what I would’ve previously exported goes into Ensus, which is a bioethanol plant built at Teesside. They have a large requirement for wheat for distilling.
With the cattle, we operate what I would call a closed herd, where all my cattle have been bred by me. I will buy a bull so that I get new bloodlines and rear my own stock and sell the calves, either as anything from a growing animal to a finished animal. The sheep are a slightly different scenario. I buy breeding sheep, usually from the hills, from the Pennines. That’s the way the sheep industry’s stratified in the UK. They tend to breed the breeding stock in the hills and move down to the lowlands where we then use what I would call a terminal sire to produce a meat-worthy lamb.
The cows themselves are predominantly Simmental cross and I currently have a Limousin bull. It seems to be working quite well. The Limousin is producing the carcass confirmation that the butchers are now looking for. The Limousin/Simmental cross makes a good beef animal, a more sizable animal, and a good mothering animal, and an easier calving animal, and one with generally a good temperament. That’s something I have to consider living so close to so many people who walk round the farm. I don’t need livestock chasing people.
When you’re farming you are fairly well restricted to your climate and your land. You can’t force a crop that isn’t suited to your land to grow because the soil and the weather will ultimately dictate whether or not that crop is successful. But I have looked at a range of other options and we always look at alternatives. A lot of people in farming try and look for the get-rich-quick scheme, but it’s a slow industry in that respect because if I want to grow a crop it’s at least a year. Really, I’m planning three, four, five years in advance what I need to be cropping, where and when.
We have good strong soil, it’s generally a clay-based soil. We do have a very varied soil, particularly at the farm in Egglescliffe because we’re on the banks of the river, so there is an element of varying degrees across the land of very good, fertile silt from the flood plain basically. Right up to solid clay as we come up the banks. So, you have to adapt what you’re doing to the land because of the variation within fields. There is always a compromise to be had.
I think farming will continue to evolve. I see the biggest changes in farming as we see it at the moment will be in technology and mechanisation. Continued use of technology for more efficient farming systems, coupled with the fact that there is also a big realisation within agriculture that just throwing chemicals at farming doesn’t produce a sustainable system. I am very keen that we continue to maintain a sustainable system and continue to adapt cultural methods to farming systems to keep it sustainable. I suppose simply, as a mixed farming system, I produce grain and straw to feed livestock on my own farm. I feed them the grain, feed them the produce, bed them up on the straw, reapply the manure back to the fields. The monoculture of, if I was just an arable farmer producing wheat, if I sold the grain, sold the straw, just kept taking things out of the ground, you’re depleting organic matter. Which has significant effects.
If it’s not financially attractive to keep cattle we will stop keeping cattle. If it’s not financially attractive to grow cereals, we won’t do it. Going back to where I see things developing in the future, the biggest influence is political. We don’t know where we are in terms of politics, we are being very heavily restricted in what we do because of political influence. We have Brexit coming up. We don’t know if we’ll be able to trade within Europe. As I mentioned earlier, we used to sell a lot of wheat into France and Spain. If we can’t sell that grain and we have a surplus to export, then it won’t be viable to produce as much wheat. So, we’ll be looking at alternatives. I’m always thinking about things. I guess that comes down to, there are always niche markets, and if you can find a niche, yes, brilliant.
You’ve got to think and plan a lot and guess a lot. Frustratingly, we do get a subsidy from the government which initially comes from, dictated by Europe shall we say. Most farmers probably would not be farming still were it not for the subsidy currently, but most farmers would like to be out of that system. How you get out of a system that is so dependent on financial support is very difficult and I suppose this is why agriculture is such an important part of the whole European debate. Europe currently I don’t believe will stop supporting agriculture. They spend a lot of time arguing with for instance the States about the support offered to agriculture. Of course, most countries around the world support their agriculture in different ways. Classically, New Zealand farmers got dumped by their government back in the eighties. They now farm without any involvement of the government. Their unions spend most of their time lobbying their government not to get involved in agriculture again. If we can get to that system, I think that will be better for everyone.
I’d say the biggest advantage of being in Egglescliffe is the location, from a non-farming perspective. We’re close to amenities. I would say Egglescliffe is located in a very attractive part of the country. Yes, there are some pretty awful bits in the region but there are also some of the best bits on offer locally. But from a farming perspective I would say that the problem with Egglescliffe is access. And as farming has become more dependent on mechanisation, we have increasing problems of getting farm vehicles, or even down to delivery vehicles, in and out of the farm, because of access. It really is my biggest issue. I have a great deal of trouble getting myself and lorries in and out of the farm, to the point that I have most people in the village recorded in my telephone and I have to send lots of text messages. Usually, I try to plan in advance and warn people that I need access when I know specifically I do, and ask them to clear the road. It’s not out of the ordinary, it’s unfortunately fairly regular. That would be the biggest problem. Most people work with me. There are a few people who get disgruntled and cause complications, shall we say. Each to their own. I think most people, when they move into Egglescliffe village, they realise that there are restrictions in terms of the ability to park cars. Unfortunately, most houses now have two, maybe three, even more cars. The majority of the houses on the route through the village have nowhere to park the car. Or have used their available parking space to increase the size of their properties.
I use a variety of methods to sell our produce. Some of it goes, as we would say ’ it walks off the farm’. We feed some of my own produce to my own livestock. Not exclusively but certainly with the cattle and sheep I only now feed them home-grown produce, whether it be grass or cereals and pulses as a protein. The only additional feed they get are vitamin and mineral supplements, and conveniently I know someone who manufactures them. The cattle and sheep I will normally sell through the market. Mostly I use Darlington market. I will sell either to what we would call in a store trade, so it goes to other producers who will finish the livestock, they will continue to grow it on, or I will sell it through the market but directly to butchers and abattoirs. I really don’t know how auctioneers can keep on top of it. They know their customers. They typically know who is in the market to buy. A good auctioneer will know which customers will be looking for which animals. So, they’ll have a good idea when the animals come in the ring as to who the likely purchasers are going to be. That’s their business. They have to know the animals, they have to know their buyers and their sellers. And their business is putting the two together. But yes, it is nods and subtle gestures because nobody wants everyone else to know who is buying.
From time to time I will buy breeding sheep. What I would buy is a mule, which is usually a cross between a Swaledale and a Bluefaced Leicester. That would be the most common type of mule, the North Country mule. Ultimately in farming the chances of mistakes are there every day. I could buy an animal for a fortune and it could walk into a field and drop-down dead. That’s a big mistake. Usually unforeseen. I would probably consider myself a more cautious buyer. I don’t get auction fever.
Cereals go through an intermediate. The customer will buy through a merchant who can source large tonnages for them. I have differing marketing arrangements. I will commit them tonnage. I spread the risk of marketing, I sell some forward on futures markets, some of it I will sell on the spot market, and some of it I commit to a marketing specialist to sell, to see if he can do better than me. It varies every year. It’s mostly done over the telephone, with increasingly internet support. I find that the reality is that it is a conversation still. I have to agree the detail.
The memories I have from when I was growing up, Egglescliffe and Eaglescliffe had expanded significantly prior to my birth (which I didn’t appreciate at the time). And so, we were always really farming in the middle of the town, where I guess the generation before witnessed this all develop. I think there was quite a good sense of community still. Probably a good sense of community of people with a bigger community because so many people had moved into the area. I recall things like the village bonfire, every year there was a Bonfire Night fire. It was great, there would be a lot of people there, a huge fire. My father used to heap it up with the tractor, everyone used to basically put all their own waste onto the fire. I always recall it was my grandmother’s duty to officially light the fire every year. We’d have a good day. One of the ladies, Mrs. Wallinger, who lived on the green, who was one of the older residents, used to make toffee apples for all the children. We were allowed a toffee apple as being residents of the village. The scouts would be there doing burger stalls and selling refreshments. It was a big event. People would bring their own fireworks, so we’d have a fireworks display. Sadly, that stopped, probably rightly so because it became too big. Too many people coming. Getting a bit dangerous with fireworks being set off haphazardly. We continue to host a bonfire on the farm which is open to anyone who wishes to attend. It’s not advertised so it doesn’t get too big.
Some of those things have disappeared. Father used to host a sports day on the green every year which I always recall being very well attended. Similarly, that dropped by the wayside. We’ve done a few since, we revived it for the Golden Jubilee, which was very popular. But I don’t see a lot of the residents in the village. When I was a child it was families who’d had a connection to the village, basically long-term residents, predominantly who lived here. As they’ve grown up and moved on the village has become very much just a dormitory village. That has made a significant difference to the community aspect I feel. There are a number of people who are very keen on keeping it going but a lot of people who just like the postcode really.
We used to attend Yarm fair every year, it was a highlight of the year locally. Really only as an amusement, it was the fair rides that were of interest. I never saw any of the tradition that I would hear about from my grandparents. My grandfather used to buy horses at the fair, which he always maintained was the legacy that the fair brought. It obviously evolved into an amusement arcade, effectively. So yeah, we used to go. I recall when we were very young having goldfish. As I’m sure anyone will appreciate some of them lasted and some of them didn’t last very long at all! A fairground goldfish that’s been swimming around in a plastic bag for a couple of days – I don’t suppose you have the best start in life.
I have no interest in the fair today. Having experienced a bit of the trouble that comes with the fair I would be pleased to see it finished. I never went potato picking. I think my brothers might have been to farms further afield, to not too far away distant neighbours to do the occasional day. A lot of farms now have stopped producing potatoes on a farm by farm basis. In fact, the majority of potato production is now done by specialist companies, farmers effectively, who tend to rent large acreages of land by renting land from lots of different farms. Usually on a rotational basis. They will be growing multiples of 500,000 acres of potatoes, and that’s all they do. That is a very mechanised job with a lot of large machinery and a big investment.