The Good Shepherd ...

It’s been a while but I better finish what I started.  

Before I left for Norfolk I had actually given Tim a rest from my dull chat in order to go and see David Sullivan.  David has been - for a few years now - this mythological figure in my brain.  John Vipond, SAC’s sheep specialist, credited him for a lot for ideas and even in my mock Nuffield interview it was suggested that I should go and see the guy.

David lives in Hampshire surrounded by pretty thatched cottages.  He owns his house but has never owned any other piece of land.  His view is that no one really “owns” land they just own a piece of paper that says they own it. He has never wanted to own land ... just farm it.

He 70 years old and has a tangible gentleness to him.  It is the first visit in 15 months of my Nuffield Scholarship where we say grace before we eat. He and his wife were childhood sweet hearts and there was never going to be anyone else for either of them.

David and Eileen Sullivan

With the exception of “Hello”, the first words David said to me were “There are no problems, only solutions”.  This appears to be the definition of how he has lived his farming life. 

Brought up in the town, his father arranged for a local farmer to give him horrible jobs as a child with the instructions “knock it out of him”.  This was in reference to David’s obsession with farming.  It didn’t work.

He was a shepherd and manger until he was 38 and had a further 6 years managing the farm of a philanthropic gentleman.  In these six years, working in unison, they moved toward a share farming system.  The agreement was he could build up 25% of the flock in his ownership. The owner would have allowed him more but this level was what David deemed fair. Integrity is everything for David Sullivan.

The next step was to expand.  He asked his local landlord if he could rent some land.  The landlord said no.  Importantly David asked him “why not?”.  The issue was security of tenure.  David went away to find a solution to his limiting factor.  If the landlord owned half the stock then security of tenure was not an issue.  Over the next few years, David developed the share farming concept on his own, without realizing there were similar agreements elsewhere in the world. He created a local sub culture, with his original landlord’s neighbours joining in. He had land and stock coming out his ears.  He had approaches from the City, as he was achieving 25% return on capital for his investors.  

Without doubt he created his own opportunities.  In doing so he placed significant importance on his natural way with people.  He is a character, he does things differently and has a great sense of humour.  He saw it as vital, whilst marketing yourself to gain opportunity, to “have a bit of style”, to do things differently with humour and to tell a story.

David was the first to develop share farming in the UK, the first to May lamb and the first to drift lamb.  He was an innovator as well as a character.  He had really testing times but saved himself by his history of integrity and his determination to find solutions. 

Messing About on Salisbury Plain ...

Its tricky writing about Tim White.  He is a follower of this blog, a great supporter and leaves rude comments whenever he feels aggrieved enough.  He is the closest thing to me I know on the farming ladder ... obsessed by sheep, has a love-hate relationship with Wiltshire Horns, seasonal lets only, started with little.  Just he’s a bit more professional and focused.  One of the driving forces behind Sheep Improved Genetics Ltd, he’s breeding wool shedding sheep in cooperation with other large sheep producers, recording everything, developing genetics, selling well.

I arrive just in time for music night in Maiden Bradley’s only pub.  People come from miles around to sing songs I’ve never heard.  Tim is on banjo and I’m on Guiness Extra Cold. Everyone is really good.  I once played the guitar and made people sing along on the understanding they had to pause for a while as I performed the tricky feet of changing chords. I don’t think I’d have fitted in playing the first verse of Leaving on a Jet Plane over a 15 minute period.

Over the next couple of days I see Tim’s sheep.  A lot of them are on Salisbury Plain.  Its poor stuff with no fences and a few tanks.  “Fields” all have to be electric fenced.  It strikes me the few first generation sheep farmers in this country might have good ideas and breed decent sheep but the system is such that we have to take the stuff no one else wants.  Tim has some good grass too but still has to be off it at short notice if the landlord needs use of it.  Enthusiasm and passion are his greatest tools.

Wool shedding hoggs with their lambs - I was jealous

There is an open day on wool shedding sheep that Tim is hosting.  EBLEX are involved and I am reminded that I wish they did Scotland too.  I talk to Liz Genever about grass.  She is behind the Grass Watch initiative and is developing really good information for sheep and beef producers, centering on rotational grazing.  I get so excited about it I start rubbing my thighs like Vic Reeves ... Liz retreats quite quickly at this point, but never turns her back.  I do manage to tell her about Cambodia ... everyone has to know - its compulsory.

"My lambs are this big at 8 weeks" Tim White converts more unbelievers

I leave Tim and his lovely family.  I wonder what the answer is.  A progressive shepherd with so much passion for his trade.  Where is the next rung for him?  I have seen a lot, observed a lot, written a lot ... but what advice can I offer Tim?  It comes as a shock to me that - after this long journey of discovery that with the report deadline just over a month away - I don’t have anything juicy to give him ... I don’t have the answer.  People like Tim deserve a break, an opportunity.  I squeeze into the camp hire car more sheepish than wolfish.  I still haven’t found what I’m looking for as I let go of the handbrake and head for Norfolk.

Don’t let the sound of your own wheels drive you crazy ....

June 6th, 7.30pm.  Foothills of Snowdon. Rona has told Arwyn Owen we are coming to stay.  Arwyn has little choice but to comply.  He shows off his batchelor cooking skills using not one but two microwaves simultaneously to produce a high quality sausage and baked potato delight.

Arwyn, too, is a Nuffield Scholar and a more gentle gentleman you will never meet.  He comes across as profoundly content.  It is a good lesson in the reality of my “let’s farm without subsidy” theory.  His hill farm has 2000 ewes that produce a gross margin per ewe in single digits.  Profit relies fully on environmental schemes and direct subsidy.  Going forward there is the tantalising promise of renewable energy income.  Yet if Prime Minister Blanche withdrew payments, Arwyn’s farm wouldn’t exist and my conscience would find that hard to deal with.  In the hills of North Wales subsidy is truly support.

Rona has also told Marnie Dobson from Cheshire - yet another Nuffield Scholar - that we were coming for lunch on Tuesday.  I take full advantage and devour a sandwich of goat sausage ... yum.  We see some goats ... they are like a charismatic version of sheep.  Niche products scare me as they require a whole new skill set ... like talking to people.

I provide two big hugs, make my apologies and leave Rona and Marnie to talk direct marketing.  I am a lone wolf again, pounding the tarmac in my camp car clothing.  I head for Wiltshire, home of the Horn and a beatnik shepherd who did a deal with the devil and now has amazing banjo playing powers. Its a long way but as the brightness of the sun comes and goes I sing along to the best road trip song ever (best served loud) ...

"We may lose or we may win/ but we will never be here again /so open up I'm climbing in"  ... genius

The Unpronounceable Lightness of Being ...

June 6th, 1:25 am. I finally get to bed. Its been a bit of a panic, getting everything done (or rather getting most things done and leaving the rest to the disappointed still-to-do-list of missed targets and spurned hope).  

But in a few hours the adventure begins again.  Its the UK Nuffield tour with recent additional dates added (essentially due to getting my act together at the last minute). I lie awake knowing I should be asleep.  The more I think about it, the further away from sleep I get.  Its probably 2:30 before I slip out of consciousness.

June 6th, 3:20 am. The alarm sounds.  I feel like a dairy farmer ... getting up in the middle of the night with an actual purpose and things to do. I slip into the very small, effeminately coloured hire car and turn the key. Vrooom, vrooom.  The full beastliness of the 1.1 litre engine pierces the silence .... eventually I realise I need to disengage the handbrake. Here we go. 

June 6th, 9.10am.  Arrive Chester Sainsburys as ordered by my new wing(wo)man Rona Amiss.  Meet Rona, say hi to her nice friend, wolf down some fatty food and caffine, visit toilets, then me and Rona wait in two completely different areas of the car park for each other.  After a reasonable period of time we eventually meet up and head west.

I have a fondness for North Wales - I bought my first sheep in Anglesey; it was the location of a legendary college “canoeing” trip; had a couple of good friends from there; one SAC visit made me start the farm business and of course The Alarm are North Walians ... quality. But it is another country inhabited by another people, that speak another tongue, one I simply cannot get a grip of.  width="425" height="349src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/t0EX6xY8aig" frameborder="0" >

"If a man can't change the world these days, I still believe a man can change his own destiny" ... wise words from The Alarm

Rhys Williams farms on the Lleyn Peninsular and is a proper Nuffield Scholar.  He has twice the number of dairy cows as I have sheep.  He is self made.  He is one of the sharpest tools in the box [NB not saying he is a tool but am saying he is sharp].  When we were all together in Washington he came out with more wise comments about business in 7 days than I could hope to do in my lifetime.

We heard his story: how his father had 10 acres and worked for the NFU, how Rhys had worked on farms, then joined DEFRA, then share milked in New Zealand for three years, then came home after a chance meeting with a progressive local landowner.  This pathway has taken him to having a half share in 1400 cows at the age of 36 and with a business that - joining the dots - must be one of the most profitable I’ve come across.

Rhys, a bloke trying to kiss Rhys and some shiny cows

He is focused on the essentials - grass, cows, people.  The system he runs is very simple in its operation but that seems the result of a lot thought. A day a week is assigned to grass measurement and management [see more on my grass nerdy blog], such is the importance of the green stuff to his profit.

He is an agricultural money making machine and should really be listed on the FTSE 100.  He is a bloke you’d want to invest in - and his landlord has - to their mutual benefit. It strikes me he ticks most of the boxes of all the variables involved in the mathematical equation of progression up the farming ladder - he acquired all the skills and is now definitely top 5%; he developed the contacts; he has proved himself a very good investment and generated his own capital as a result;  he concentrated on the essentials and ignored the irrelevant; he has been bold and had the courage of his convictions; he innovated and implemented a system that most local worthies would have shaken their heads at.  But it all worked.  

We say farewell and travel back to the hills.  When you meet someone like Rhys its easy to be hard on yourself ... why aren’t you doing that well?; why aren’t you doing this?; why aren’t you doing that?.  Its been a long road but I now realise that I am me and people like Rhys are people like Rhys ... and that’s OK!

Its a sad, sad situation ....

I confessed back in March 2009 that I wanted to apply for a Nuffield Scholarship. The confession was to a very focused, previous Nuffield Scholar.

“What do you want to study” said the slightly intimidating Nuffield Board member.

“I thought something on grass” replied the very intimidated clueless Michael Blanche

“Yeah?  The interviewers really look for interesting studies ... you need to think again.”

I did think again. I chose to look at the Farming Ladder instead. Yet actually my study has gone full circle.  To climb the Farming Ladder I have to aim to be in the top 5% of producers.  To do that, having a ruminant enterprise, I think I have to move significantly forward in my grassland management.

Hopefully I’m off to France to look at intensive grazing systems including Techno Grazing at the end of June.  In the meantime, I am starting a cell grazing trial and obviously this demands a separate blog devoted my mistakes in this regard.  It is definitely “specialist interest” but if you want to feel more interesting by indulging in just how dull someone else can be try the new grazing blog.

I managed to get some assistance from Rappa Fencing for the trial so I am a bit chuffed with myself ... it will never last!

Embarrassing bodies ...

Weird,  Pseudo-Scientist Michael Blanche (25) has made yet another genetic breakthrough.  Based on years of slap dash research and lazy development, the innovation means a step change in carcass value of sheep meat by providing six legs per lamb:

You should be able to count 6 legs ... only 4 work

Commenting on the biggest revolution in sheep genetics since Dolly, Professor Blanche said, “I was sick in my mouth when I saw it ... its gross.  At least its alive ... makes a nice change.” 

Zack Dingle Rides Again ...

A Multiple Choice Paper recently completed by Michael Blanche:

Qu. 1.  Both your cars die in the same week ... both will cost £2,000 each to fix ... you have less than that in the bank ... its 3 weeks before lambing and you have 750 sheep to shift off your old grazings.  Do you: 

a) Adapt

b) Innovate

c) Overcome

Answer - Adapt.  Buy a van for £700. Immediately acquire the nickname Zak Dingle from your neighbours.  Order a shiny red Hilux on contract hire which you probably can’t afford but as it takes 4 months to arrive the cool thing is you don’t have to think about it yet.

The Van ... hardcore!

Qu. 2.  You have purchased this “totally awesome” auto-drafter and have lots of stuff on a computer thingy relating to each sheep’s EID number.  If you don’t manage to link the ewe to her lambs, half the point of recording for genetic gain is lost.  You have always numbered your sheep before lambing with spray paint which by the time they lamb you can never read.  You get tired very easily and catching ewes, outside is beyond you.  Do you:

a) Adapt

b) Innovate

c) Overcome

Answer - Innovate.  Copy Lynton Arney - the nice man with the nice Border Leicesters from Oz - and make up neck tags using hi-viz tags and bungee cord that you can use next year too.  Be too concerned about choking sheep and make cord far too long. Go round picking most of tags up that fell off as soon as sheep stooped to graze.

If you look closely enough you might see a tag round its neck

Qu. 3.  You are desperate for grass and you get 180 acres of this:

Spot the ryegrass plant competition

Do you:

a) Adapt

b) Innovate

c) Overcome

Answer - I have no idea.  I’ll get back to you.

Pride Lost, Navel Found ....

London is exciting.  Mainly because, if I’m in it ... I am usually in it for a reason ... on purpose ... and not by mistake or due to taking a wrong turn. 

This time it was The Farming Ladder conference.  Organised by Sir Don Curry and Dennis Chamberlain. It had the same title as my Nuffield study and meant I felt obliged to go.

I think this sort of conference helps and there were some really good speakers.  This said, I came away feeling a bit empty.  A previous scholar told me at a get-together last year to “be selfish” in my study ... I’d get far more out of it.  I didn’t want to do that.  I wanted to help and come up with suggestions and potential answers.  Now I realise that there are plenty of suggestions, lots of ideas and a good number of potential answers ... its just that very few of them will actually make it all the way to practical policy. Taxation changes are sorely needed. Agricultural Holdings legislation could do with being reformed or even repealed ... with more imaginative options introduced.  The subsidy system protects the established and punishes the new.

Yet the conference convinced me that the only person in the room that was going to help me ... was me. The historic battle between landlord and tenant rumbles on, each taking a stance the other can’t accept.  George Dunn from the TFA was really impressive, a very clear thinker and excellent communicator.  I wish he was on my side ... but he’s not. He started off by saying it was vital that the calibre of entrants into farming had to be high .... hear, hear!  Then he proceeded to put forward the assertion that succession tenancies - where the only test of your calibre is who your father was - were the BEST farming ladder ... were THE farming ladder.  

Succession is the key to the farming ladder! [cue sigh of exasperation] .... And so the land constipation of this country will continue to cause discomfort.

Trying to draw parallels with diarrhoea prevention and interventionist legislation ... probably stretching it

If the tenants were the Imodium with a high level of intervention in the letting process ... the landlords seemed to take the more prune juice approach of the free market. Freedom of contract rules OK!  I sympathise with this attitude far more.  Yet it dramatically depends on trust. Trust hasn’t been prolifically used in this ancient struggle. Also, and crucially, freedom of contract tends to put off the issue of investment to another day ... ad infinitum.  When tax incentives were discussed and it was suggested that certain loop holes be closed ... some landlords got a bit edgy. “Lets have a system that suits us” was the message my cynical ears heard. 

Essentially, it was a conference where vested interests were vocalised ... albeit lined with good intentions.  It is useful to talk and outline your position ... jaw jaw rather than war war, and all that. 

What struck me, though, was that before legislation ... before policy ... attitudes need to change ... paradoxical cultures need to develop and recede.  The conference was helpful in chipping away at this.  But as we talk, we are also part of a huge orchestra of fiddles ... we play intently ... as Rome burns.  The bastions of the past will be the bastions of the future.  UK agriculture ... its quality ... its merit ... its pride is being suffocated by short term views, short term greed and an inability to see beyond our own, very personal, navels. 

Nero "fiddling" while Rome burnt ... I always thought it was a violin

Going round the world - where no one looks to the UK for agricultural guidance - is a humbling process.  No one rates us!  This is the country of Townsend and Bakewell ... this is the country that was the stud farm to the world ... this is the country that invented the tractor, the plough and the threshing machine.  We have been distracted by chasing subsidy ... where a meeting on a new support scheme attracts an audience of 200, whilst a technical seminar gets an audience of 10.  We are disabled by our historic struggle for the control of land. We now think in individualistic terms ... our farm business ... our land owning business.  We only think of "our industry" when it comes to supporting it with payments with other peoples money.  All the lobbying ... all the talk ... is to do with subsidy, intervention and regulation.  We don’t seem to have a communal pride in our real industry anymore and we no longer judge it on production or on innovation.

Bakewell ... in my Top 20 Hero List

A perfect storm is brewing.  Food is going to be a big issue in 2030 ... and big business.  In the UK we'll probably still be talking at conferences, fearful someone else might benefit slightly more than us ... whilst the rest of the world have left us behind. We were once a world leader in production, we had an industry to be proud of in a worldwide context.  Unless we think ... and, more importantly, act ... to free land up, to make an industry that is merit based, where the best farmers farm - whoever their father was ... we will never have that pride again.

Like a Virgin ...

“My name’s Michael, thanks for coming .... you know you guys will always be special to me [cue slight unease in small group of complete strangers, straight off a mini bus from Aberdeenshire] .... I was a farm visit virgin ... and I’ve lost my virginity to you ... [cue unintentional but creepy smile from Michael].”

Some things sound a lot better in your head before departing from your brain, stopping briefly at your vocal cords then finding their final destination in a vast lonely expanse of open air and in the tangible discomfort of fellow human beings.

It was the first time I had a group come and see the sheep though.  I spent most of the time saying they weren't very good, even though I think they are.  I talked for over an hour about the sheep, how I started, what I do, what I feel and about the people I met during my Nuffield trips.  The Nuffield part of it might have been forty minutes of blether but it had to summarise eight and a half weeks of travel.  It focuses your mind on what the main issues have been.  Obviously, I admitted in front of grown men (and women) that I almost cried speaking to other grown men (and women) about Cambodia.  I then proceeded to get a bit emotional about it all over again.  That country gets me going every time.

No one fell asleep this time. Largely because they all had to stand ... in the cold ... 

Notes to Self: 

1. Pursue mild forms of enforced discomfort on any future audiences to prevent them snoring
2. Man up re. Cambodia, for goodness sake!!

The Free Radical ...

Last Monday lunchtime. Hendersons Salad Bar, Hanover Street, Edinburgh.

I am here to meet a real, live author ... one that writes books an’ that using actual words, some of which exceed my psychological barrier of 10 letters. 

I bought Andy Wightman’s book “Who Owns Scotland” in 1996, when I was still a Land Agent.  It pointed out an injustice of so much of this country being owned by so few of its inhabitants.  As a Land Agent, I acted mainly for land owners and companies with amazing powers of compulsory purchase.  Most of my clients were lovely, good people but there was always a feeling that I was playing for the wrong side.  I worked hard in training, at the end of the day I gave it 110%, without a shadow of a doubt ... but I took their money to help them make more of what they already had ... and there was always a slight guilt to it.  

Andy Wightman - author who knows some big words

Andy seems far more principled.  Injustice seems his defining motivation.  He has been described as Scotland’s leading Land Reform activist. There is a twinkle in his eye when he describes situations where he has publicly pointed out an inequity and an unfairness.  He seems to do this with a clarity that reveals something obviously unjust to those blinded by either the complexity and confusion of the subject matter or burdened by vested interest and extreme passion for their own position.

Anyway, back to the Salad Bar.  Andy orders the biggest “croquet” I have ever seen ... in my mind the rules on croquets centre on the assumption that a proper one can’t be more than 5 cm long ... this one smashes this rule by at least two fold.  I have a big crepe ... (a joke I really enjoyed when I was 8 and still find amusing today).

I had bought Andy’s new book “The Poor had no Lawyers”. I had got to page 42 by Monday and - in a panic, not wanting to appear ignorant - also read half a chapter on subsidy. The book sits in the bathroom where I can read it during my “quiet times” ... I quickly realise I should have had more “quiet times” before I met him.

We talk about inheritance.  There should be a law that land is transfered equally to all children in a family, not just one. Land would then be in the hands of more people and the land monopoly we have would be broken. We talk about Land Value Tax.  This would introduce a basic fairness to taxation and eliminate the excessive values of land and homes - that sees loss-making dairy farms in the west of Scotland selling for over £1 million.  Why should all rural businesses pay business rates other than landowners?  Andy tells of a method of redistribution of land in the Netherlands where a group of owners who feel their land holding is becoming fragmented put their satellite units into a pot and swap them for somewhere nearer ... the fact this would not happen here, says a huge amount about the land culture we live in.

I enjoy our chat ... and my big crepe.  I notice Andy has a freedom in his opinions. He doesn’t mind challenging perceived “wisdom” on land issues and the aggressive negativity that sometimes comes with such a challenge.  Rather he seems to revel in it.  As we leave he talks of some gifted individuals ... who can’t express what they really feel because they are employed by companies with vested interests.  I realise I’m in a privileged position ... as my own boss, I have a certain freedom already ... even amongst the constant craving for cash, it is this overarching freedom that makes it worthwhile. 

Back at the house, I read more of the book.  It has some really interesting stuff in it.  The history of how land was effectively stolen, grabbed or taken.  How tenanted farms represented 69% of holdings in 1940 and 28% of holdings in 2008.  How 20% of the Single Farm Payment in Scotland is recieved by just 2.77% of farmers ... almost a third of the budget being given to just over 5%.  He quotes Winston Churchill and Adam Smith to support his case. 

It makes me think ... I seem to have been buffeted by divergent and very strong opinions all the way through this Nuffield study ... I bend with this wind, listen to everyone and see all the points of view.  Quite often it seems, I don’t have my own voice ... or maybe its having a fear to let it make a noise.  It would be easier if it were black and white ... if people were entirely wrong or entirely right.  Andy appears to use justice as a benchmark and fairness as a gauge ... that’s not a bad start on the long and winding road toward clarity. 

Dying is Easy, Public Speaking is Hard ...

Despite what the most recent blog posts suggest, I’ve been back in the country for a month ... I’m just really slow at constructing sentences and thinking about words containing more than four letters.  My brain speed seems to be constantly in first in the low ratio gearbox (or whatever that smaller stick next to the bigger stick in my pickup is called).

Imagine then, my discomfort when I had to speak at a Scottish Enterprise Rural Networking Event in Ayr on Tuesday.  Talking out loud has never been a strength of mine.  Putting a lot of words together in the right order over a 30 minute period is hard ... and harder still when 24 people are looking at me with total bewilderment in their eyes and 1 is fast asleep.  Talking in public requires a fast and sharp brain ... no luck there then.

I got a few laughs but not nearly as many as I'd hoped ... I should have brought a snare drum and symbol to communicate what I just said was intended to be amusing.

Embarrassing highlights included: reading out lyrics from a Mylie Cyrus song (the bewilderment factor was raised at least three notches during that error of judgement) and almost crying when I talked about Cambodia ... voice quiver ... dramatic pause ... it was really close.  I talked about emotion a lot, and bared my soul a little ... to the point I expect most of the audience were uncomfortable and thinking I should really go and see Dr Bonkers (the famed Psycho-analyst).

That said there were some things I said that had potential.  It focused me.  Oddly I appreciated so much more of what I had learnt in India and Cambodia during the process of speaking in Ayr.  If I came back from those countries with one word it would be “Innovation” ... although this is neck and neck with “Perspective” and “Sorry”.

I still need a lot of practice in speaking out loud though .... a LOT of practice.

[in the style of the Batman theme] da na na na na na na na - Hat Man! ...

In my last post I briefly mentioned a chance meeting with an elderly man who wore a hat ... on a plane ... who sang songs in public.  I also mentioned that the Raipur leg was my nominal contribution to the organisation of the trip.  The first day went well ... largely because Ricky Thaper organised it ... not me.  

Day 2 proves more of a challenge.  There is nothing arranged. In desperation to please my restless colleagues, I phone Hat Man on Day 1.  He is in “a meeting” and says he’ll phone me back ... he doesn’t ... I berate myself for thinking he might.  Next day ... a lie in, a relaxed breakfast, we get to 11.30 and no one has complained directly about doing nothing but there is an undeniable air of frustration.  We try to take a rickshaw to a Walmart to see what an Indian supermarket looks like.  The non-English speaking rickshaw driver reckons I must have meant the centre of town and takes a punt, leaving us lost in a busy street ... nowhere near a Walmart.  

Just as all hope of not wandering around aimlessly is at an end ... Hat-Man phones.  He has been to our hotel with his brother - head of the agricultural department of Chattisgarh.  His brother has had to leave for a “meeting” but we head for his office. Raipur is a big city ... we are the only westerners ... as we start the goose chase, people stare, smile and wave.  We enjoy our adventure ... at least, I do.  I smile and wave and even do the “thumbs up” more than is technically cool, as we walk.  

After asking at least five times for directions we get to the office.  Hat Man is actually called Mr Poorit and he is high up in a renewable energy company (Tony likes renewables so he is pleased).  Mr Poorit is a character.  A former colonel in the Indian army, a veteran of three wars he possesses a personal wisdom that comes from a very full life.  I love old men like Mr Poorit. He is excentric, mischievous and warm ... what I want to be when I’m old. I feel we click and have an odd bromance for 20 whole minutes.

Tony, me and Mr Poorit ... in the final of the "Funniest Face" competition.
Above Tony's head there is a picture.  It says "... for everything you gain; you lose something else; it is about your outlook towards it; you can either regret ... or rejoice".  Deep! 

He tells us that Indians are misers, they are real business men and ... in a Borat type moment - they are “like the Jew”.  Britishers are nice but they are not financially as bright as Indians.  Mahatma Gandhi was a good guy but his policy of non-violence was wrong. If someone hits you, you hit them back harder.  I loved it ... not because I agreed with everything but just because his opinions were definite and devoid of malice (though I suppose hitting people isn't that nice).

We finish by singing a Doris Day song in the middle of a busy office... “Que Sera, Sera, ...Whatever will be, will be ... The future's not ours, to see ... Que Sera, Sera ...”  Given my midlife crisis and my palm reading that shows I have no life line from now on ... I consider this appropriate.  We shake hands, knowing we got on well, but knowing we will never see each other again.  I am emotional about our farewell, which I wasn’t expecting.  Goodbye Mr Poorit ... the honour was all mine.

Intensive Care ....

Delhi airport.  Its Thursday.

We have said goodbye to James. We cry longingly on each others shoulders and seek professional advice for our combined loss.  Obviously I am using sarcasm to cover up the fact that this is almost true.

After taking all the responsibility for so long as group leader, organiser and Michael Blanche’s chief carer, Tony gets a well earned rest.  He has been immense.  We had a tipsy chat in November. I said I was going to Cambodia and India. He said he’d like to come ... thereafter he organised almost everything.  If it wasn’t for him I think I’d still be at Phnom Penh airport trying to work out how the electronic doors worked.

This was the part of the trip I “organised”.  This basically involved asking Ricky Thaper (treasurer and spokesman for the Poultry Federation of India) to organise things for me.  We meet Ricky ... he laughs at my jokes ... what a great guy!! 

We fly to Raipur, capital of the state of Chattisgarh.  I sit next to an elderly man with a hat.  He sings a lot. I join in when I can.  He insists we contact him during our visit.  I am not sure if this is a terrorist trap.

The next day we visit the ABIS group.  Owned by Mr Bahadur Ali, the business had 10,000 broiler chickens in 1985.  Now it turns over 2.5 million birds per cycle and there are 7 cycles per year.  It has quarter of a million breeding birds.  He has a 2,500 dairy cow herd and 1,500 buffalo. He has a huge feed mill. He produces pet food, fish feed and 5,000 tonnes of solvent.  The milk is packed and sold under his own label.  30 veterinarians work in the business ... everyone we meet is called “doctor”. The business has a 2,500 labour force.

The Group with one of the many Doctors and Ricky in the foreground

I’d seen vertical integration before but this seemed to also include horizontal, backwards, forwards and sideways integration too.  You sensed there were no barriers in ambition or, indeed, implementation.  There was no fear in growing the business.  It was like going to visit the aftermath of a huge business explosion.

At the end of our day we meet the main man - Mr Bahadur Ali - he walks in and there is an aura about him.  He is more comfortable speaking his native tongue ... which adds to the mystery.  His questions are incisive and very focused.  Weirdly, his questions are kind of answers in themselves as they seem to reveal what the important issues are on a particular subject.

He explains how he took his business from a humble beginning to one of the biggest agri-businesses in India.  From 1985 to 1996 he built the business’s effectiveness.  But growth was relatively slow. 1996 saw him attend the International Poultry Congress and that event seems to have transformed his whole business. His vision was radicalised ... to drive for scale and vertical integration.  Thereafter, the growth graph was close to being as vertical as his integration.  It rang a bell ... this was the graph a share milker in New Zealand drew me on the back of an envelope ... it was the graph a Kiwi equity partner now worth millions of dollars showed me on his computer ... the graph of an effective first generation business.  Frustratingly slow growth then .... ker-bam (if that is a word) ... a steep line upwards thereafter.

The ABIS group operate - as far as I could work out - on just over 100 acres.  I’ve seen intensive agricultural businesses before but this was another level.  I know its not quite a true benchmark figure - they rely on other farmers for a lot of raw material and some of the enterprises are beyond agriculture - but the business’s Output ... my calculator tells me ... is over £1.5 million per acre!

The wonder of labour - everytime a calf defecated there was someone on hand to clear it up

Mr Ali asks us about the potential for a serious sheep business in India.  I suddenly get a dose of verbal Delhi belly ... my words come straight from my head through my mouth without touching the sides.  I thought it would be a great idea ... introduce better genetics ... get hold of lots of land ... rely on scale ... on and on I went ... it was becoming interminable.  Mr Bahadar Ali asked what stocking rates we had in the UK for sheep.  4 ewes to the acre on decent permanent pasture, up to 7 on good stuff, I said ... I was unstoppable ... I thought he would be impressed.  The colleagues from ABIS looked at each other, paused and then laughed for a long time ... 4 ewes per acre versus £1.5 million turnover per acre.  

Being laughed at made me think.  Land in Chattisgarh would be worth around £30,000 per acre.  We don’t have values like that ... yet.  However, if the land price in the UK continues on its crazy path ... I’ll probably live to see the day they are.  We will still only have land that supports 4 ewes to the acre.  Maybe the Indians were right ... it is comical.  Intensification and integration are a lot more serious. They can feed the world. Taking this theory to its logical conclusion, maybe the sheep industry has no future on any land that can be used for any other conceivable purpose.  Its a cheap land enterprise and cheap land may never be again. Maybe the entire UK sheep industry will be forced to retreat to the hills ... spending the rest of its days with its begging bowl held high.

Bright Colours, Broad Brush ....

Taxi rank, Udaipur Airport, Rajasthan, India.  Its Monday.

The established farmers want an air-con taxi ... the new entrants want to spend as little money as possible (especially the one (clue: not Rona) who has lost his wallet). We would prefer to spend £10 less and wind the windows down.  The group splits: 3 to worship the air-con god with me and Rona on the budget deal.  It slowly dawns on me that 1800 rupees divided by two is more than 2400 rupees divided by three .... bugger!  

I smell smells in the warm air that rushes through my open window.  Yet its the bright colours that have most impact.  These colours are man made and worn by man but feel intrinsic to this land.  Ladies with saris of vivid pinks, yellows and reds; men have turbans of equal brilliance.  

The “established ones” laugh at us as they pass in their decadence ... then take amused pleasure in pointing out the aforementioned arithmetic when we arrive at Ranakpur two hours later.  I go in a huff for a total of 3 whole minutes.

We are staying in tents ... but nice ones.  Tony loses the drawing straws contest and has to endure my snoring ... yet again.  We are met by Ilse (she is German) and Hanwant who run LPPS, an organisation that aims to preserve sheep pastoral and camel herding traditions and rights.  They take us immediately to a sheep shearing “festival”.  The shepherds are dressed up for the occasion.  They chat, laugh and smoke as they part the wool, slowly and deliberately, from their sheep. This is not about economics but about brotherhood.

Smokin' Mike Blanche .... it was just tabacco ... I think

I tell them that I have 600 sheep and achieve a 150% lambing ... it is the first time anyone has been impressed with this .... I should come here more often.  For a few moments I am the Shepherd God ... in my own mind.

The next morning we are taken to see camels and their herders.  Hanwant honours us by presenting us with turbans from his Rajput (warrior) caste.  He has not accounted for the fact I have a head so big, my neck could theoretically snap at any minute. It is so huge scientists have recognised that it possesses its own gravitational force and that tiny moons orbit round it. The Turban sits awkwardly well above my cranium’s full circumference. 

The Rajasthani Massive ... Kevin doesn't have height issues ... he's just kneeling down

Again the herders are far less about money and far more about life ... about relationships with their animal charges and with each other.  They give us camel milk, warmed as it would have been warmed a millennium ago.  They proudly stuff Neem leaves up a camel’s rectum and then clamp the aforementioned orifice with a split stick.  I wince as my imagination allows me to go through the logistics of how this procedure could be completed ... with me as the patient. 

The clamping procedure - do not try this at home!  Nice turban colours though. 

In the afternoon we have a deep debate then go to a temple - Kevin provides the sound track with a full discography from Walt Disney’s Jungle Book.  In the evening we visit Ilse and Hanwant for dinner.  We see the camel poo paper being made and hear about the camel milk ice cream. They are innovating in order to preserve - rather than change - a way of life. We have yet another deep debate ... I'm starting to enjoy them in a masachistic kind of way.  

In the morning I have time for one more huff before we leave ... I must be on my man period.  I travelled Australia and New Zealand on my own.  Here I have four strong and admirable characters with me.  I learn much from all of them. They make me question things.  Sometimes - in business terms - I feel far, far behind them.  I think I am burdened to be like my fellow Rajasthani shepherds ... less about economics, more about brotherhood.  I fear I will always be short of money as I give up any possibility of wealth as a sacrifice ... to my very own ... God of Dreams. 

Camel milk actually tasted pretty good. Light and frothy ... mmm!

Either I've grown, or this is a small camel.  The unfortunate head size to turban circumference ratio / matrix dilemma, can be seen clearly here. 

Carry On Up the Punjab ....

Somewhere near Chandigarh, Punjab, India.  Its Saturday. The group now numbers five ... we’re not exactly famous but at least three of us have had lashings and lashings of ginger beer the night before.

We take a walk through Chandigarh centre to experience the shabby madness that seems to be standard in India’s urban centres. James gets his shoes polished.  I do too. James pays his polisher the equivalent of 20 times the normal rate .... everyone gets very excited ... a rather large and amused crowd has now gathered ... its all I can do to convince my man 7.5 times the correct rate is acceptable. I power walk ... hips wiggling vigourously ... away from the problem.

The initiation of the shoe shine incident ... before the crowd gathered

We are picked up by the sophisticated Kanwal.  Tony - our glorious leader - had found his farm stay on the internet. It turns out its like some sort of cyber gold rush ... the guy is brilliant.  We visit two dairy farms, inspect wheat and vegetables.  The Punjab is India’s Japati basket. 44% of the grains (rice and wheat) produced in India are produced here ... on 2 % of the country’s farm land.  Bare agricultural land values range from £30,000 to £60,000 per acre ... hope value (for future development) has a massive impact that drives up price even further.  The Green Belt around Chandigarh can command up to $500 million for 1 acre. 

Land in Punjab was subject to severe legislation after independance.  The maximum holding any individual could own was set at 25 acres. This together with subsequent splits via inheritance means farms are small (90% of farms in all of India are 5 acres or less) ... yet 3 crops of maize a year is easy in Punjab, one guy reckoned 4 was possible.  The first dairy farmer we meet tells how his grandfather dug a well in 1947 and only needed to go to 10 feet; his father then dug a well in 1962 and had to go deeper - 62 feet; then he himself had to dig a well in 2010 ... to get to water he had to bore to 500 feet.  Such is the challenge in the Punjab ... what the weather giveth, the weather (and extreme irrigation) now taketh away.  The significant move to dairy ... away from thirsty rice ... is a reaction to this challenge.

We meet the head of the village and all his family ... he has a big family.  We drink sugar lightly diluted with warm buffalo milk. We drink tap water.  We are an attraction. A child comes in and as if in awe of a deity,  swiftly kneels to touch Rona’s sandals then quickly departs.

The village leader and his family ... just after we'd drank tap water

We return to Kanwal’s house and meet his father.  He is a serene Sikh gentleman with a warm sense of humour.  We learn much just talking to the father and son team.  From their reading of my palm, I learn that I have had a midlife crisis and the future is not foretold ... I consider this does not represent new information. I then worry that there is no life after the mid life crisis thing and keep looking at my palm in case the line has formed yet.  They both get very excited by James’s hand, its so unusual I think they might wet themselves in some sort of synchronised urination display.  He is nicknamed golden hands for at least ten minutes.

We giggle on and off for another 24 hours ... we have deep debates ... we learn many new things about India and each other ... until on our last night we up the giggle intensity ... I giggle like I haven’t giggled for a long, long time.  My stomach hurts as I go to bed - its a happy hurt ... though it still could be the tap water. 

The Dogs That Bark at Elephants ....

Its not so much politics in Cambodia but rather power. Corruption is systemic and blatant ... so blatant there’s almost an honesty to it.  Some said that at least it was obvious rather than in the western world where its duplicitous and subtle. Another theory I got was if there were a change of government there would be even more because those in power now are already very wealthy.  Anyone new would have to build up wealth through yet more corruption.  

There is a stability provided by the current administration, but sights like the many brand new Range Rovers driving through Phnom Penh, suggest there are hundreds wealthy as well as millions poor.  This wealth is almost certainly not gleaned from moral business practice, built on compassion for their fellow man.  A bloke down the pub (always the best sources) told me half the aid coming into the country is “lost” but could probably be found again in the shape of the flash cars driving around its capital city. These drivers scare me.  They feel untouchable.  One person explained that there is a saying that the people are dogs and the ruling class, elephants.  Dogs might be able to bark at elephants but little else.  Elephants are untouchable, undefeatable, unstoppable. Thoughts of political improvement for its population are burdened by a hopelessness that seems so absolute and so conspicuous.

You consider temporarily that maybe its not so bad ... in the west we seem so self righteous that our way is the best way ... maybe democracy is over-rated ... maybe there is freedom in an absence of regulation.  Then you realise that there is no protection of people.  There are few rights.  The Economic Land Concessions in Cambodia that recently hit the headlines where 1 million hectares of land has been taken over by corporate firms is an example.  Many who “own” land, don’t.  The legal rights for land ownership are blurred in most instances.  It seems the small farmer in these cases get money for their farms but it is a surreal compulsory purchase - money or AK-47 - that’s the choice.

Economic Land Concessions represent the sound of ideologies clashing.  Cambodia can’t move on agriculturally without efficiencies in scale and technical expertise .... corporate farming is a quick fix ... the capitalist answer.  But individual people should have rights to what they have ... they should be respected and cherished not bullied and stolen from ... profit of the few can’t in anyway excuse the immediate suffering of the many.  There is a sadness and an intense injustice to it all. 

In a land where over 70% of the population have an income of $2 a day or less whilst the ruling class drive around in £75,000 lumps of metal, concealed by blacked out windows ... you start thinking there must be a better alternative species to belong to than human beings.