Cool. Let the government buy large chunks of land back and start rewilding it and repairing our ecosystem
theoldkitbag on
Made the point before; the state ought to have a fund to retire farmland as old farmers age out. They could even structure it as a form of reverse mortgage. It’s a perfect opportunity for recapturing back land for the public good.
Playful-Parsnip-3104 on
Without intending to convey that this isn’t a serious problem, I wonder if the survey responses have been skewed by the green cert requirement. You can’t inherit a farm without a green cert. I wonder if ‘formal successor’ in the survey was defined as someone who could take over the farm today if needed – i.e. someone who has a green cert. I expect many farms have a clear successor in mind (namely a child) who hasn’t yet obtained his green cert, so can’t be formally named as such.
I know a few farmers who were in this situation until recently: their children wanted to inherit the farm, but weren’t yet old enough or hadn’t yet had time to complete the prerequisite courses needed for a green cert. They all now have their green certs and could technically take over the farm at any time, but perhaps if they’d been surveyed in this way a couple of years ago their farms would have entered the statistics as ‘lacking a formal successor.’
Certainly any farmer who has himself inherited his farm in the last few years is less likely to have adult children ready to take over from him, which makes the two-in-five statistic much less scary when you think about it.
qwerty_1965 on
Sell the land make small farms bigger and more efficient.
disagreeabledinosaur on
I’m thinking of a farmer I know.
He is in his 30s. His dad still farms but ownership of the farm has been passed down because that’s been incentivised*
My 30 something year old friend has no formal successor, although there’s a good chance it’ll be one of his preschool aged kids.
In the context of this kind of arrangement, I do wonder how much of technical arrangements on the ground are obscuring statistics like these from having any meaning.
Older farmers with a clear successor may have already passed ownership to the successor for tax reasons. If you only look at older farmers, then you miss a big cohort who have already handed on the farm. The ones left are naturally the ones without a succession plan.
Younger farmers don’t have a successor because they don’t need one. If you look at all farmers, then you’re including a big cohort for whom succession planning is not urgent.
5 commenti
Cool. Let the government buy large chunks of land back and start rewilding it and repairing our ecosystem
Made the point before; the state ought to have a fund to retire farmland as old farmers age out. They could even structure it as a form of reverse mortgage. It’s a perfect opportunity for recapturing back land for the public good.
Without intending to convey that this isn’t a serious problem, I wonder if the survey responses have been skewed by the green cert requirement. You can’t inherit a farm without a green cert. I wonder if ‘formal successor’ in the survey was defined as someone who could take over the farm today if needed – i.e. someone who has a green cert. I expect many farms have a clear successor in mind (namely a child) who hasn’t yet obtained his green cert, so can’t be formally named as such.
I know a few farmers who were in this situation until recently: their children wanted to inherit the farm, but weren’t yet old enough or hadn’t yet had time to complete the prerequisite courses needed for a green cert. They all now have their green certs and could technically take over the farm at any time, but perhaps if they’d been surveyed in this way a couple of years ago their farms would have entered the statistics as ‘lacking a formal successor.’
Certainly any farmer who has himself inherited his farm in the last few years is less likely to have adult children ready to take over from him, which makes the two-in-five statistic much less scary when you think about it.
Sell the land make small farms bigger and more efficient.
I’m thinking of a farmer I know.
He is in his 30s. His dad still farms but ownership of the farm has been passed down because that’s been incentivised*
My 30 something year old friend has no formal successor, although there’s a good chance it’ll be one of his preschool aged kids.
In the context of this kind of arrangement, I do wonder how much of technical arrangements on the ground are obscuring statistics like these from having any meaning.
Older farmers with a clear successor may have already passed ownership to the successor for tax reasons. If you only look at older farmers, then you miss a big cohort who have already handed on the farm. The ones left are naturally the ones without a succession plan.
Younger farmers don’t have a successor because they don’t need one. If you look at all farmers, then you’re including a big cohort for whom succession planning is not urgent.
*I’m a city person so not sure on these details.