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Farming Today: Agriculture workers shortage, Intensive farming, Little terns on Chesil Beach

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16/07/2018

Agriculture workers shortage, Intensive farming, Little terns on Chesil Beach

BBC Radio 4 - Farming Today, Agriculture workers shortage, Intensive farming, Little terns on Chesil Beach

A shortage of migrant labour has left one farmer staring at a field of rotting fruit.

A shortage of migrant labour and a bumper crop has left one Scottish farmer staring at a field of rotting fruit.

Repeated warnings by the British soft fruit industry that there will be a lack of suitable labour to pick this season's harvest are now coming home to roost. Farming Today reports from Scotland where a valuable crop is lying rotting in the field. All this week we'll be looking at intensive farming. Is a small traditional mixed farm with Jerseys wandering around a meadow better for the cows than on a so-called mega-dairy where they're housed in barns all year round? Today Steffan hears a definition of intensive farming from Janatha Stout from the Royal Agricultural University in Cirencester. The only colony of little terns in the south west is flourishing despite storms destroying many nests across the country. The protected bird is in decline around the world, but for the last two years a record number of chicks have hatched on Chesil Beach. 

Presented by Steffan Messenger

Produced by Alun Beach.

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