Small is beautiful-fruit growing as if flavour mattered
Preface
On January 29th 2002, Prime Minister Blair, welcoming the publication
of
The Policy Commission on Farming and Food report, (the Curry report)
said..
".. agriculture needs to change. As the
Commission note, the current situation benefits no-one: farmers, taxpayers,
consumers, or the environment. Farmers struggling with the lowest incomes
for decades don't need me to tell them that.
The Commission's vision for a future of sustainable food and farming
industries is one that many will find attractive. But, as ever, the challenge
is in getting there. We want to work with farmers and all other stakeholders
to build a consensus for change.."
Clearly, these are times of change and uncertainty for all involved in food production. The Policy Commission, chaired by Sir Donald Curry, was set up in the wake of the devastating foot and mouth disease epidemic, which followed the costly BSE disaster and food poisoning problems such as E.Coli 0157. The decline of the home top fruit industry has been more drawn out and with few headlines, but equally ruinous with many growers quitting and orchards grubbed. The public is full of doubt and fear about Genetically Modified Organisms, worried about pesticide residues in food, and also wants access to a countryside that it wishes to be farmed “more sensitively”. The Curry report reflects these views in it’s calls for subsidy to move from production to environmental support, less pesticide use, more co-operatives, and more direct sales from farm shops and farmers markets.
My wife Julia and I have been doing many of these things since 1993, without subsidy, on a small fruit holding on light grade 2 land in southern Hampshire. This essay is an argument for a renaissance of small family farms. These have been judged “uneconomic”, but the economics of consumer choice and international trade are changing, bringing new threats and opportunities that call for new thinking.
Introduction
We manage 5 acres of mixed fruit, mainly apples with some plums and soft fruit, in Durley, Hampshire. During the 9 years since we bought the land and started planting, I worked as a GP in the NHS; Julia has cared for the orchard between housework and childcare, I work there at weekends and holidays. We are in our mid-forties with 2 teenage daughters. We have no agricultural background or training. “Hobby farmers” we may be, but we grew and sold 4 tons of our apples profitably last season year and expect to quadruple this by 2005. I contend that old fashioned, small, family-run fruit gardens can and should make a bigger contribution to the British fruit industry.
Where the industry is today
Since we have lived in Southern Hampshire, we have seen one small local Pick Your Own orchard cut down (ponies now graze there) and another close its much-loved farm shop. The loss of public access to these orchards has diminished the joy of living in our part of Hampshire. This mirrors the national experience. I have seen felled orchards in Oxfordshire and Somerset, a sorry sight. The killer frosts of April and May 1997 were the last straw for some growers-I saw my newly set fruitlets turn black and fall off. EU money was made available to grub orchards and some growers took the opportunity to exit an apparently failing industry.
Land of the Golden Delicious
We sell direct, so we look our customers in the eye and hear what they have to say. Many blame the French for the decline of our top fruit industry. We politely differ-we admire French growers and want to learn from them. Of course, they have advantages of climate and land borders that we don’t enjoy, but 2 of their “advantages” could be adopted here-the traditional local markets that we all love to visit when abroad, and co-operatives, where small growers organise and invest together to buy the best equipment and develop markets to common advantage.
How they do things in France
The French have a knack of embracing the new while holding on to the best of the old. Driving south a few years back, we saw many orchards of all sizes from Normandy and Brittany to the Loire. North of the Loire, we drove for miles though a gigantic apple orchard. The trees were in supported rows as far as the eye could see on both sides of the road, S-bend cordons with long laterals, strikingly uniform in contour, laden with pink blossom. We speculated on the cost of establishing such a venture and the number of skilled workers it would take to prune the seemingly endless rows of perfectly shaped trees. We were highly impressed, but when my mind wanders back to France I remember with more affection the many farmhouse orchards of forty or so standard trees, under grazed by brown and white spotted cows. The big farms efficient at producing bulk fruit, the small farms efficient at producing a beautiful countryside and choice products that pull in tourists. The hyper-efficient mega-orchards supplied export and supermarkets, while the smaller orchards attached to family farms sold apples or cider direct to local markets. There is room for both, the old and the new, the small family and the industry giant, side by side in apparently peaceful co-existence. But in England today I fear that we have lost the small fruit farms, to our detriment, and may soon find that we cannot beat foreign competition for the large units. We may if we are not careful get the worst of both worlds.
On the same trip, we saw apples in a small town greengrocers. “Goldens” were offered at 5f per kilo, about 24p a pound, but beside them were Belles de Boskoop and Reinettes, high quality aromatic apples we had read about but never seen before, at twice the price of the dull yellow apples. We bought some and though past their best at that season were still richly flavoured. So, Golden Delicious is good enough for children, and the English, who don’t value apples of higher quality such as the Boskoops and Reinettes, which are grown in France but not exported. So who destroyed our orchards, foreign growers or British buyers? The British public must be encouraged to buy local, but they can’t be forced. What would entice them?
The end of the small family farmer?
Years ago, when our orchard was still only a dream, we were shown round a big, modern fruit farm in southeast England. It had high input spindlebush hedgerow planting, leaf trace element analysis, 10 tons of Cox per acre, refrigerated gas storage, the lot. The manager told us of a local grower who each year brought his half a ton of D’Arcy Spice apples to the co-operative in the forlorn hope that they could sell them for him. He was felt to be out of time, anachronistic. The world wasn’t like that any more, get big or get out was the philosophy in fruit as in other businesses. We were sorry but could see the point-after all, if we buy 70% of our food from multiple retailers who advertise on national press and TV, and if consumers want a predictable product all year round, then what price to the supermarkets an irregular supply of a quirky russet with a dark olive skin that looks dirty? The fact that it has a historic connection with place and connoisseur flavour is as irrelevant as the fact that a little old man on a farm down the lane would like to make a living from it.
I expect that old orchard of D’Arcy Spice is gone now-but the way the industry has been going, the big modern orchard may be gone too or about to go. Big and modern as it was, the orchards in the Pays de la Loire and New Zealand I saw on my travels are bigger and more intensively worked, as well as having better conditions both climatically and politically. So which is the dinosaur heading for extinction? And which most worthy of an attempt at conservation?
Can we afford not to downsize?
No-one doubts the commitment and skill of British growers, but the market takes no prisoners and many have already bitten the dust, on a far from level international playing field. Can British growers compete successfully for the supermarket trade with Chile, Argentina, Tasmania, Holland, France, Italy, New Zealand and now China? When apples are an internationally traded commodity paying the grower less than 30p a kilo, and when buyers offer little or no security to growers, those who have already made their investment will hang on and do their best, but borrowing money to buy land and plant a new orchard in the hope of profit looks like betting on Southampton for the FA cup! (NB when this was written in 2002, Southampton FC were in deep trouble and facing relegation, but the following year, incredibly, they did actually make it to the FA cup final, although they lost the match. They won the FA cup in 1976. The point of which is that maybe this wasn't the best metaphor but that also crazy things CAN and DO happen!) Therefore it looks unlikely that significant new capital will enter the industry to replace post-mature orchards. They are more likely to be bought by corporations or mega-rich individuals as a tax loss or for development.
If fruit growing is to revive and prosper in England, it needs new entrants. The food trade has no commitment to the survival of British growers. I argue that at least some of the new fruit growers needed are people, ideally couples, with a lot of heart and a little capital who want to cultivate a few acres, selling local to make a “small country living”.
I propose a raft of measures to encourage and facilitate a renaissance of small-acreage family run fruit farms, producing quality fruit, some of it organic (only possible on a small scale farm), to sell direct via local outlets, including farm shop, farm gate, box schemes, food co-ops and Farmer’s Markets. A little carefully targeted seed corn money with goodwill and imagination could go a long way to help this happen. These new fruit gardens could be as small as half an acre and average 5 to 10. Big arable farmers could have tax breaks to lease 5% of their holding to an orchardist. The effect on biodiversity and landscape would be marvellous, more deserving of a grant than the ludicrous “set aside” scheme. If as seems likely the Curry report is heeded, this may be wise counsel for even the most hardheaded agribusinessman.
Pleasure and profit from face-to-face sales
We sell our apples direct to the public for £1.00 a kilo (increased since but still less than supermarket prices) and always offer a slice to taste. We do this partly because most people have never tasted or even heard of apples like Orleans Reinette, Ellison’s Orange, Kidd’s Orange Red, Miller’s Seedling or Pitmaston Pineapple, (which by the way is a national disgrace as these apples are as much a part of our heritage as France's hundreds of cheeses) and also to build relationship with our potential customers and as a unique selling point. Few people taste without buying, many express delight at the forgotten flavour of real apples. Small, local and flexible, we can take our customers’ preferences into account, and will shortly be top-grafting 2 rows of Spartan over to other varieties our customers prefer, Ashmead’s Kernel, Suntan and Adam’s Pearmain.
We love our customers. Many tell us about the wonderful old apple tree in the garden of their youth. One man at the Winchester Farmer’s market smiled in delight when we said “Yes” to his question about whether we grew Ashmead’s Kernel. He hadn’t had any for years. We were glad to oblige. Other customers tell us they had given up eating apples due to their tastelessness and didn’t eat any when they couldn’t get ours. This is not to say that we are master orchardists, but our apples are choice old varieties, ripened and stored naturally and have travelled few miles to the eater so they have eating qualities which are absent from the Braeburn, Gala, or Pacific Queen which is picked unripe and shifted 12,000 miles in a refrigerated gas container to be sold half a world away out of season.
I’m not inventing this-customers frequently tell us that they have stopped eating apples because they are so tasteless. That is the main argument of this essay-there could be an increase in apple eating and therefore growing in this country if we could get the product and the placement right for these lost customers. By the way, I rarely eat apples other than our own, and when I do I am reminded why I am doing this.
Diversification to order
We also boost profits and spread the season with a few plums, soft fruits and orchard products like cider, jams and preserves. Again, because we sell face to face and want repeat custom, if people ask for gooseberry and elderflower jam or sloe and damson jelly, then we will make some. The plum and ginger sauce was such a success that we will plant more Victorias. People keep asking for Devonshire Quarrenden, so we tracked some down and planted some, and will graft to sell trees.
A new kind of farmer for an age of portfolio careers?
Who will the new farmers be? A retired headmaster, Geoffrey Bell, told his story in a book “Establishing a Fruit Garden” (Stanley Paul & Co, 1963). He wanted to quit his teaching job while he was still enjoying it, so took an early pension and bought 6 acres, planted an orchard and built a house and a simple fruit store on it. He made a living and employed several workers. We are following in his footsteps. Others might do the same, given a chance. People are living longer now, and may not wish to stay in the same job for life. I believe there are people who have made their money, paid off their mortgage, seen their children leave home, and want to do something creative, new and challenging with the 15 or more years of physical and mental strength left in them. If they can take an actuarially reduced pension from age 50 as is now possible, they won’t need to earn a fortune from the farm. This may cause the minimum size of a “viable economic unit” to be reduced. Some, given encouragement and advice, would put their savings or money released from downsizing their house to develop a small acre orchard which could produce high quality, environmentally sensitive fruit and fruit products to offer people who want to buy fruit with more character and fewer food miles from a grower whose face they know.
What would help it happen?
The planning laws must change to allow bona-fide growers to live in mobile homes on their small acre orchards while the fruit garden and business is being established. Only once it is profitable and meeting agreed environmental targets would permission to build permanently be granted-no developer scams allowed! Some people are against all new building in the countryside, but who can say that one house is too high an environmental price to pay for a new orchard selling quality fruit in local markets? Few can find the £300,000 plus required to buy a farmhouse with land, but many could find the price of 5 acres and a mobile home, given the necessary planning changes. This could help reverse rural decline whilst enhancing the countryside.
Farmer’s Markets must be encouraged. Hampshire county council takes a positive and helpful stance-Winchester farmers market where we have sold our apples is popular, established and growing.
Customers love local
People shop for value, but many will see value in a quality product with a heritage and rarity value attached. Ashmead’s Kernel or Orleans Reinette instead of Granny Smith in a Waldorf salad will impress dinner party guests. They will then want to hear about the “lovely little fruit garden” you have discovered, where you can get apples and other goodies fresh from the grower, and as a regular customer can go for an orchard picnic in blossom time or for a hog roast and hot spiced cider at harvest home or wassail time. There is a market for quality, English heritage apples and orchard products waiting to be developed. The keys to moderate economic success for the smaller grower (there are no big cash fortunes to be made here) are the better margins and repeat custom that come from a direct relationship with the customer.
The World Wide Web could help
Better information access is required for the new grower-the mid life career changer cannot go to agricultural college for 3 years, nor are there courses which will adequately speak to this new kind of entrant. The mistakes we made were basic and could have been prevented through knowledge and coaching. The trouble was, we could not access the kind of help we needed. The Internet offers a resource for learning, teaching and networking which despite the hype is still woefully under exploited. I put a basic website up at fruitwise.co.uk (NB now at fruitwise.net, as you may have noticed) with a minimum of instruction and little cost. Someone trained and with a modest budget could do far better. There is an excellent site for the small grower at applejournal.com, but being American, it is of limited practical help to new English growers. We found few English growers on the web, lots in the USA and New Zealand. A government or industry organisation that wanted to encourage small growers could achieve a lot for a minimal outlay by establishing a site for small growers.
Useful though books can be, there have been few new books on apple growing for many years, and even fewer that speak to the modern small grower (Michael Phillips “The Apple Grower”, Chelsea Green 1998, is a notable exception.). The Common Ground book of orchards is lovely too, but more inspirational than practical. The web is the way forward for quick, cheap information exchange for new small growers.
What would I like to see?
So, where will UK fruit growing be in 2020? I don’t know, but if the next 2 decades are like the last, it could be hard times for those who depend on the supermarket trade and have large overheads and loans. People like us may move into the space vacated by the demise of the mainstream industry.
Our older customers have not forgotten what locally grown, traditional, naturally stored apples taste like. They want them. Our customers of all ages are becoming aware that the apples they want to eat and the apples the industry finds it convenient to sell them are not the same. They tell us repeatedly that they are glad to get some locally grown English apples from the grower in their proper season. An industry that moved in this direction might have a more secure future, employ more people, and deliver a prettier countryside than is the case today. Orchards are beautiful-let’s make sure our grandchildren don’t have to go to Normandy to see this for themselves.
The future of English apple growing should include a renaissance of the 5-10 acre mixed fruit garden that is part of a community rather than a commodities trade. Given a little goodwill and sympathetic regulation, this can happen.
In Durley, Hampshire, it already has.
Dr Stephen Francis Hayes
6th February 2002