0:00:07 > 0:00:12Farming in Britain in the 20th century underwent a total transformation.
0:00:12 > 0:00:15The agricultural revolution was as far-reaching
0:00:15 > 0:00:19as the revolution in industry had been in the 19th century.
0:00:20 > 0:00:24No area of farming was left untouched.
0:00:24 > 0:00:30And at the forefront of those changes was the way farmers grew and sold wheat.
0:00:31 > 0:00:33Wheat is iconic.
0:00:33 > 0:00:38A field of wheat rippling in the breeze sums up agriculture
0:00:38 > 0:00:42and the bread that we make from it symbolises human food.
0:00:42 > 0:00:49In just three generations, wheat farmers replaced horse power with machine power.
0:00:49 > 0:00:55Scientists shrank the size of the plant and yet more than doubled the yield.
0:00:56 > 0:01:00And Britain moved from being dependent on imported wheat for bread
0:01:00 > 0:01:03to becoming almost self-sufficient.
0:01:03 > 0:01:08The transformation in the way farmers produced wheat was remarkable,
0:01:08 > 0:01:14but what's also unique is the way that the people who led the changes documented them.
0:01:14 > 0:01:20Their home movies offer us a unique insight into the wheat revolution -
0:01:20 > 0:01:23how and why it happened, and its consequences.
0:01:42 > 0:01:44Draw a line down the United Kingdom
0:01:44 > 0:01:49and on the flatter lands of the East you will find acres of wheat.
0:01:51 > 0:01:59In the 1930s, most it was produced on small-scale farms by a large labour force of men and horses.
0:01:59 > 0:02:05The wheat was used largely for animal feed or for biscuits and cakes.
0:02:05 > 0:02:09Nearly all of the wheat needed for making bread had to be imported from North America.
0:02:12 > 0:02:17By the end of the century, wheat production had been utterly transformed.
0:02:17 > 0:02:22The horses and most of the men had been replaced by complex machinery
0:02:22 > 0:02:25on increasingly large-scale farms.
0:02:25 > 0:02:32Crop yields had doubled and Britain was almost self-sufficient in the wheat needed to make bread.
0:02:36 > 0:02:42This programme tells the story of how these astonishing changes took place
0:02:42 > 0:02:45through the lives of three farming families in the east of England.
0:02:45 > 0:02:48The Cresswells in Northumberland.
0:02:48 > 0:02:53The world is now looking for our wheat in a way that it hasn't for a very long time.
0:02:53 > 0:02:56The Coopers in Suffolk.
0:02:57 > 0:03:02You are taking risk decisions every day of the year.
0:03:03 > 0:03:07And the Lathams on the borders of Essex and Cambridgeshire.
0:03:07 > 0:03:09The business of farming has changed enormously.
0:03:09 > 0:03:13Most people wouldn't recognise me as a farmer...
0:03:13 > 0:03:15my job as a farmer.
0:03:15 > 0:03:20That's because I'm not so hands-on as I used to be
0:03:20 > 0:03:23but I still see myself very much as a farmer.
0:03:28 > 0:03:32John Latham's family have been farmers for generations.
0:03:32 > 0:03:36And they've been filming their lives since the 1930s.
0:03:39 > 0:03:47This film of John's granddad, waving at the camera from the back of his reaper-binder, is from 1938.
0:03:54 > 0:04:00From the 1930s, the family has lived and chronicled the wheat revolution on their farms.
0:04:01 > 0:04:07In 1992, John Latham took over from his father, another John,
0:04:07 > 0:04:10and nowadays he also manages his uncle Simon's farm.
0:04:12 > 0:04:15In the '60s, Simon would be farming 400 acres
0:04:15 > 0:04:17with, what, three chaps on the farm?
0:04:17 > 0:04:20- Four.- Four in the '60s.
0:04:20 > 0:04:24And we're doing 4,000 acres, well, nearly five next year,
0:04:24 > 0:04:30and we've got two full-time chaps doing all that with some part-time labour and some help at harvest.
0:04:30 > 0:04:35That's how the technology has... just transformed the scale.
0:04:35 > 0:04:39It's a transformation that has also seen wheat yields rise sharply
0:04:39 > 0:04:42in John's father's lifetime.
0:04:42 > 0:04:45We're getting nearly double now to what we got 30 years ago.
0:04:45 > 0:04:50And that is plant breeding and...technology.
0:04:50 > 0:04:52Yeah. Absolutely fantastic.
0:04:55 > 0:05:00For cereal farmers, the harvest has always been the most significant time of the year -
0:05:00 > 0:05:03a collective gathering and celebration.
0:05:03 > 0:05:05This is John aged five.
0:05:07 > 0:05:10The whole family decamped to the fields and helped get the wheat in.
0:05:12 > 0:05:16We spent the whole of the summer holidays either doing the combining
0:05:16 > 0:05:21or the potato picking or anything like that. No-one thought about health and safety in those days.
0:05:21 > 0:05:22Ignorance was bliss.
0:05:27 > 0:05:28And this is John's mother,
0:05:28 > 0:05:33talking to Freddie Salmon, who worked for the Lathams for 35 years.
0:05:37 > 0:05:40We used to come down that hill on a four-wheeled trailer
0:05:40 > 0:05:46- and it used to go so fast that the trailer used to...- Wobble. - ..go Z-shaped down the hill.
0:05:46 > 0:05:51We used to be thinking that was great fun. We didn't realise how damn dangerous it was!
0:05:51 > 0:05:57And then we used to sit in the bottom of the trailer while the combine used to unload
0:05:57 > 0:06:01and we ended up up to our chests in wheat sitting down.
0:06:01 > 0:06:05Dust, everything. Ladybirds, earwigs, you name it, they were all in there.
0:06:05 > 0:06:07Plus us dirty kids!
0:06:27 > 0:06:30For generations, the Lathams have farmed in Lancashire.
0:06:30 > 0:06:34Then, at the start of the 20th century, a branch of the family
0:06:34 > 0:06:38moved south to Essex, where land was less expensive.
0:06:38 > 0:06:46In 1933, newly-weds Thomas Latham and wife Anne came here, to Lucas Farm near Chelmsford.
0:06:48 > 0:06:53From their honeymoon, Thomas wrote to thank his farm workers for their wedding present.
0:06:55 > 0:07:00I feel I cannot let this evening pass without leaving a message to you all.
0:07:00 > 0:07:06I have finished the lonely furrow and I have found a team-mate to run with me in double harness.
0:07:06 > 0:07:13I wish you all good health and happiness and that slice of luck so essential to us all.
0:07:13 > 0:07:19As a son of the land, I join hands with you this evening in friendship of Auld Lang Syne.
0:07:19 > 0:07:21Now, isn't that lovely?
0:07:26 > 0:07:30The description of a team-mate in double harness is apt.
0:07:30 > 0:07:36In the film shot on the 60-acre farm before the war, horses are still a prominent feature.
0:07:42 > 0:07:4960 acres wasn't a big farm by Essex standards, even in those days, but it was good soil.
0:07:49 > 0:07:53Very productive, some of the best wheat-growing land in the country.
0:07:53 > 0:07:58And so it was a start but it was all jolly hard work.
0:07:58 > 0:08:02In 1933, this farmhouse was fairly...derelict.
0:08:02 > 0:08:07My father and mother spent 1934 putting a new roof on the place.
0:08:11 > 0:08:14John was born here in 1938.
0:08:16 > 0:08:21This is him as a baby with his father and grandparents.
0:08:25 > 0:08:28There were about six men on this farm
0:08:28 > 0:08:31and a lot of them were of the Crouchman family
0:08:31 > 0:08:34and there was Freddy Crouchman, who was the old boy,
0:08:34 > 0:08:39and his son Johnny Crouchman are the two that I can just about remember here.
0:08:43 > 0:08:49There in the cart, there's my two elder sisters and they're sitting by Johnny Crouchman, who's driving it,
0:08:49 > 0:08:52and I'm sitting on the knee of Freddy Crouchman, his father.
0:08:57 > 0:09:01These home movies paint an idyllic picture,
0:09:01 > 0:09:06yet in the 1930s arable farming in East Anglia was in a crisis.
0:09:08 > 0:09:10My grandfather worked really hard.
0:09:10 > 0:09:15He died at the age of 78 and he was absolutely worn out.
0:09:15 > 0:09:23The '30s were desperate times and my grandfather and father found it very difficult to make ends meet.
0:09:23 > 0:09:26They really were quite... almost insolvent and the banks
0:09:26 > 0:09:30wanted to call the money in on the farms and put us out of business.
0:09:30 > 0:09:32In 1929...
0:09:33 > 0:09:37..the world crisis leads to a collapse in all commodity prices
0:09:37 > 0:09:41and, particularly in Britain, the price of cereals.
0:09:42 > 0:09:46The import of wheat from North America
0:09:46 > 0:09:50really severely damaged British farming.
0:09:53 > 0:09:58Wheat as a commodity, wheat as a TRADED commodity.
0:09:59 > 0:10:06This means that particularly the small and medium-sized cereal-producing farmer
0:10:06 > 0:10:09really did face substantial problems.
0:10:10 > 0:10:17Many left the land but, like the Latham family, the Coopers from Suffolk managed to keep going.
0:10:18 > 0:10:23Harold Cooper started his working life on his father's farm during the Depression.
0:10:23 > 0:10:26# Happy birthday to you!
0:10:26 > 0:10:31# Happy birthday, dear Harold... #
0:10:31 > 0:10:34Today he's celebrating his 90th birthday.
0:10:34 > 0:10:36APPLAUSE
0:10:41 > 0:10:47Like the Lathams, there are several generations of Coopers farming in Suffolk.
0:10:48 > 0:10:51Harold's son Ashley now runs his farm.
0:10:51 > 0:10:54Done much harvest yet?
0:10:54 > 0:10:57Oh, yes. We're going well. Done about half, have we, Ashley?
0:11:00 > 0:11:04And Oliver, Harold's nephew, manages a farm near Ipswich.
0:11:04 > 0:11:07You were 14 in 1932.
0:11:07 > 0:11:13The global depression hit really hard and it hit two industries harder than most -
0:11:13 > 0:11:16general manufacturing in the North and farming in East Anglia.
0:11:16 > 0:11:19You just couldn't GIVE land away
0:11:19 > 0:11:25and by 1934 wheat prices reached their all-time low in real economic terms.
0:11:25 > 0:11:31They got down to under £5 a ton, and it didn't pay farmers to thrash the stuff,
0:11:31 > 0:11:33there was no market for it.
0:11:33 > 0:11:34Very tough times.
0:11:37 > 0:11:40In the early '30s, things were very, very depressed.
0:11:40 > 0:11:48The word that was quite commonly used in our house was, "We've got to economise."
0:11:48 > 0:11:50That was one of my mother's phrases.
0:11:50 > 0:11:54"We've got to economise. We've got to cut down on this and that."
0:11:55 > 0:12:00For 300 years, the Coopers had been tenant farmers in Cheshire
0:12:00 > 0:12:04but in 1906 Harold's mother inherited enough money
0:12:04 > 0:12:08to enable them to move south to Suffolk and buy Manor Farm.
0:12:08 > 0:12:11Harold began work there in 1932.
0:12:12 > 0:12:20Just before my 14th birthday, I left school and came back to help on the farm. I had two brothers.
0:12:20 > 0:12:22We employed...
0:12:22 > 0:12:28two men to start with, where there had been 13 or 14.
0:12:28 > 0:12:34That was one of the sad things really but that's what happened.
0:12:34 > 0:12:37We had to work hard, we worked long hours.
0:12:41 > 0:12:46At that time, getting in the harvest was a laborious business,
0:12:46 > 0:12:48as this 1934 film shows.
0:12:48 > 0:12:52First the wheat had to be cut, often by a horse-drawn binder.
0:12:52 > 0:12:56Then arranged in stooks, so it could dry.
0:12:59 > 0:13:02Sometimes, particularly in northern Britain,
0:13:02 > 0:13:06some was kept in thatched stacks until the time came for thrashing -
0:13:06 > 0:13:10the process by which the ear, or grain, was separated from the stalk.
0:13:11 > 0:13:15The grain then had to be stored in sacks.
0:13:16 > 0:13:21These traditional techniques were expensive and labour intensive,
0:13:21 > 0:13:28so Harold's innovative father decided to take a huge risk with some new technology.
0:13:29 > 0:13:34'34 was the year when the Royal Show,
0:13:34 > 0:13:37Royal Agricultural Show, came to Ipswich
0:13:37 > 0:13:42and at the Royal Show there were all the most modern American equipment.
0:13:42 > 0:13:48American combine harvesters, things we'd only dreamt of seeing, we were able to see and touch.
0:13:48 > 0:13:56And I think we'd learnt as much there as the normal person would learn in years!
0:13:59 > 0:14:01As the name implies,
0:14:01 > 0:14:05the combine brought together the cutting and thrashing process.
0:14:05 > 0:14:08It reduced time and labour significantly
0:14:08 > 0:14:11and left the farmer with grain that could be sold immediately.
0:14:14 > 0:14:17There was only 50-something in the country altogether
0:14:17 > 0:14:23and they were generally in the hands of large estates...
0:14:23 > 0:14:24where the...
0:14:24 > 0:14:30No, I don't want to be too critical, but the owners were more like playboys.
0:14:32 > 0:14:38And finally in 1936 we purchased the Case combine,
0:14:38 > 0:14:42which was for us a great step forward.
0:14:50 > 0:14:54The American company that we bought it from, Case,
0:14:54 > 0:14:58they sent a representative, who stayed with us for several days,
0:14:58 > 0:15:03and he made sure that we could use the machine correctly.
0:15:03 > 0:15:09We were lucky that the first one or two years were dry years, lovely summers, everything was dry.
0:15:09 > 0:15:13It was just like working on the prairies in Canada or somewhere,
0:15:13 > 0:15:16but the general opinion was...er...
0:15:17 > 0:15:22..people would see my father and say to him, "Do you ever use that machine?"
0:15:22 > 0:15:26The reaction was, "Well, that'll never work in this country!"
0:15:26 > 0:15:28The Coopers were unusual -
0:15:28 > 0:15:32most farmers relied on horse and manpower,
0:15:32 > 0:15:38but by the mid-1930s the threat of war was changing everything.
0:15:40 > 0:15:46It's clear that from...certainly 1935 the new Ministry of Agriculture
0:15:46 > 0:15:50was thinking about the possibility of a future European war.
0:15:50 > 0:15:52By 1936,
0:15:52 > 0:15:59the ghost committees were all in place, ready to run agriculture, should the war begin.
0:16:10 > 0:16:14- NEWSREEL:- For the second time in 25 years, war forced us to take stock
0:16:14 > 0:16:17of our agriculture and of the men who live by it.
0:16:17 > 0:16:23For the second time, we have had to reclaim millions of derelict acres which we now need so badly.
0:16:23 > 0:16:26Once war was declared,
0:16:26 > 0:16:33they switched to the policy of 1917, with a payment of subsidies
0:16:33 > 0:16:37to plough up land for the production of food,
0:16:37 > 0:16:41but particularly the production of wheat and of oats.
0:16:52 > 0:16:57Half the farmland which had been neglected hadn't been drained,
0:16:57 > 0:17:01or the ditches hadn't been cleaned and that sort of thing,
0:17:01 > 0:17:05so there was a tremendous demand for land drainage
0:17:05 > 0:17:09and we were working all the winter of 1941...
0:17:09 > 0:17:12er...well, almost every day.
0:17:12 > 0:17:16It was a very, very cold winter, 1940 and '41.
0:17:17 > 0:17:23Between 1939 and 1942, county war agricultural committees,
0:17:23 > 0:17:26War Ags as they were known,
0:17:26 > 0:17:30oversaw the ploughing up of three million extra acres.
0:17:30 > 0:17:36To help this initiative, combine harvesters arrived on lease from America,
0:17:36 > 0:17:41and in Essex one of the farms that benefited was the Lathams'.
0:17:41 > 0:17:47At the Second World War, my father had bought this part farm at Thaxted
0:17:47 > 0:17:49and he was still farming this farm
0:17:49 > 0:17:52and he was also farming Longbarns Farm
0:17:52 > 0:17:56and he applied to the War Ag for a combine
0:17:56 > 0:17:59and agriculture was extremely important in the Second World War.
0:17:59 > 0:18:03Our survival, with the U-boat threat, depended on our ability to feed ourselves,
0:18:03 > 0:18:06so my father applied for this combine and he got one.
0:18:06 > 0:18:09He got a wonderful Massey Harris 21,
0:18:09 > 0:18:13which was a 12-foot self-propelled combine,
0:18:13 > 0:18:16and it was a wonderful tool for its time.
0:18:18 > 0:18:22Farmers were paid subsidies to grow more cereals
0:18:22 > 0:18:27but, as the war ended, many, like Harold Cooper in Suffolk, became anxious that the policy
0:18:27 > 0:18:31would be dismantled and they would return to the years of insecurity.
0:18:32 > 0:18:40Most arable farmers were very fearful that things were going to go back where they had been before the war.
0:18:40 > 0:18:45We always had that in the back of our mind, so we were laying plans
0:18:45 > 0:18:50to go back and produce as cheap as ever possible again
0:18:50 > 0:18:55to combat this... danger that we thought we saw.
0:18:56 > 0:18:58Harold needn't have worried.
0:18:58 > 0:19:04Despite the wartime plough-up campaign, wheat yields had hardly risen
0:19:04 > 0:19:08and, after 1945, Britain was desperately short of food.
0:19:09 > 0:19:12The country was effectively bankrupt
0:19:12 > 0:19:17and could not afford to pay for imports, so the Government decided
0:19:17 > 0:19:22to maximise home production by continuing the war-time subsidy policy.
0:19:22 > 0:19:28In 1947, it passed what many believe to be the most significant piece of
0:19:28 > 0:19:33farming legislation of the 20th century - the Agriculture Act.
0:19:33 > 0:19:37I think the 1947 Agriculture Act underpins absolutely
0:19:37 > 0:19:42what's gonna happen to farming for the next 50 to 60 years.
0:19:42 > 0:19:50What it means is that arable farmers in particular are now protected against the vagaries of the market.
0:19:50 > 0:19:52They can plan for the future.
0:19:52 > 0:19:57They know that in five years' time they won't necessarily be making a fortune
0:19:57 > 0:20:02but they certainly won't be making a loss in terms of the world prices of wheat.
0:20:12 > 0:20:18This new policy of subsidies in the form of minimum guaranteed payments made a huge difference.
0:20:18 > 0:20:22It gave farmers the confidence to invest.
0:20:22 > 0:20:27Farmers like the Cresswells, who began farming in Northumberland shortly after the war.
0:20:27 > 0:20:31- An epoch-making time for us... - HE LAUGHS
0:20:31 > 0:20:35..was when we bought our first self-propelled combine,
0:20:35 > 0:20:40and it cost £880.
0:20:40 > 0:20:44Terribly underpowered, and when you got into a 20-acre field
0:20:44 > 0:20:48with that little six-foot cut, you thought you'd never get out of it.
0:20:49 > 0:20:54It was 1954 and Charles had just completed his National Service.
0:20:55 > 0:20:59He and his father, recently retired from the Navy
0:20:59 > 0:21:02after a war spent protecting the transatlantic convoys,
0:21:02 > 0:21:08decided to buy Spindlestone Farm near Bamburgh Castle on the Northumberland coast.
0:21:08 > 0:21:12Wheat has been grown in Northumberland since the Bronze Ages,
0:21:12 > 0:21:15but yields had hardly risen for centuries.
0:21:17 > 0:21:21If you had neighbours who told you in the '50s that they were growing
0:21:21 > 0:21:28two tonnes to the acre of wheat, you practically for certain knew
0:21:28 > 0:21:35that they were fibbers and, you know, they were looked upon as being great exaggerators.
0:21:35 > 0:21:42Now, if you don't grow four tonnes of wheat to the acre, you know you're a duffer.
0:21:45 > 0:21:51Increased food production was the aim of the 1947 Agriculture Act.
0:21:51 > 0:21:54Bigger yields per acre was what was needed,
0:21:54 > 0:21:58and the government saw science as one of the tools to help achieve it.
0:21:58 > 0:22:00Science has the answer.
0:22:00 > 0:22:03We know now what can be done.
0:22:03 > 0:22:08Munitions factories must be changed over to make farm machinery.
0:22:08 > 0:22:14Experts can say what kind of seeds should be sown, what kind of fertiliser should be used.
0:22:15 > 0:22:18I went to a lecture given by a foremost...
0:22:18 > 0:22:23agricultural scientist I think it was, Sir John Boyd Orr,
0:22:23 > 0:22:30and he said that in a few years' time we would all be growing two tonnes of wheat per acre.
0:22:30 > 0:22:35We were growing then about maybe a tonne, perhaps a tonne and a half,
0:22:35 > 0:22:40and he said, "In a few years' time you'll all be growing two tonnes or even over
0:22:40 > 0:22:47"and I foresee in the future that you'll be able to grow perhaps four tonnes an acre."
0:22:47 > 0:22:52Well, we... I shall never forget this lecture because...
0:22:52 > 0:22:54hardly anyone believed him!
0:22:55 > 0:23:01Farmers had benefited from science before the war, but it was often rudimentary.
0:23:03 > 0:23:07This film shot in 1934 on a neighbouring farm to Charles Cresswell
0:23:07 > 0:23:11shows just how makeshift the approach was.
0:23:12 > 0:23:18Well, this will be some extraordinary weedkiller, this.
0:23:18 > 0:23:20I think they're going to...
0:23:20 > 0:23:23we're going to see one of the first crop sprayers,
0:23:23 > 0:23:27copper sulphate, incredibly poisonous stuff now.
0:23:27 > 0:23:30We used to use it for treating sheep's feet
0:23:30 > 0:23:36and that would be breaking about 102 Health and Safety at Work regulations now.
0:23:36 > 0:23:38And there it goes, down to the field.
0:23:38 > 0:23:43I rather think that it could be my friend as a child sitting in the back.
0:23:43 > 0:23:46There it is, spraying away. Brilliant!
0:23:46 > 0:23:51The chap is working the handle from left to right furiously to keep the pressure up.
0:23:51 > 0:23:56- HE LAUGHS - And that will kill some broad-leafed weeds.
0:23:57 > 0:24:02But that's a very early film of spraying, quite extraordinary.
0:24:03 > 0:24:10There's a whole lot of technology and chemistry which has been out there... really some of it since the 1920s,
0:24:10 > 0:24:13which nobody has touched, and gradually this technology,
0:24:13 > 0:24:18this chemistry, starts to be introduced across the arable sector.
0:24:24 > 0:24:31The 1947 Act had created the perfect environment for the chemical companies.
0:24:31 > 0:24:37The government policy of financial support for farmers signalled to companies like ICI
0:24:37 > 0:24:40that there was now a growing market for their products.
0:24:40 > 0:24:46Pesticides, herbicides and, above all, new artificial fertilisers.
0:24:47 > 0:24:52These fertilisers contained the major nutrients for plant growth.
0:24:52 > 0:24:55Nitrogen, potassium and potash.
0:24:55 > 0:25:00And, with their use, farmers could plant a wheat crop on the same land each year.
0:25:00 > 0:25:05Originally in this area, and I was brought up in that way,
0:25:05 > 0:25:10we had quite a lot of what we call fallow land, that is, land with nothing on.
0:25:10 > 0:25:16Well, with the coming of the... very good scientific approach
0:25:16 > 0:25:21and the use of chemicals, we were able to grow a good crop every year.
0:25:21 > 0:25:23We were able to crop every year.
0:25:23 > 0:25:27There was clear evidence that the new chemicals could increase yields,
0:25:27 > 0:25:31but little awareness of their potentially toxic effects.
0:25:32 > 0:25:39By 1958, Harold Cooper's nephew, Oliver, was helping out on Manor Farm in Suffolk.
0:25:39 > 0:25:45This is him aged 13, driving the tractor to collect grain from his father's combine.
0:25:46 > 0:25:50One of my memories as a child was a chemical called DNOC
0:25:50 > 0:25:53which was a very yellow liquid.
0:25:53 > 0:25:56I'm sure it got very high toxicity levels.
0:25:56 > 0:26:00We all had in the industry a sort of pretty cavalier attitude
0:26:00 > 0:26:03to health and safety and self-protection,
0:26:03 > 0:26:07but many of the products we used were quite nasty by today's standards.
0:26:07 > 0:26:12You know, working with agrochemicals like that in my father's generation,
0:26:12 > 0:26:16they've probably been the most exposed generation of all
0:26:16 > 0:26:20in terms of actual physical contamination of the products they used,
0:26:20 > 0:26:25direct physical contamination on their hands, on their skin, in their eyes.
0:26:25 > 0:26:30Dad would smell of some products when he came in that were being used as herbicides in those days.
0:26:30 > 0:26:36By the late 1960s more than 200 pesticides were in common use,
0:26:36 > 0:26:42but there was also growing evidence about their damaging effects on wildlife and the environment.
0:26:42 > 0:26:47The most notorious was the synthetic insecticide DDT.
0:26:47 > 0:26:51The ecologists were pointing out that DDT
0:26:51 > 0:26:54and chlorinated hydrocarbons like that
0:26:54 > 0:26:58produced thin shells in the...
0:26:58 > 0:27:02in the eggs of the birds at the top of the food chain,
0:27:02 > 0:27:06the raptors, things like peregrine falcons and that kind of thing,
0:27:06 > 0:27:10and so a question began to arise.
0:27:10 > 0:27:14Are these pesticides actually always a good thing?
0:27:14 > 0:27:17The answer was actually, no, they're not.
0:27:17 > 0:27:21DDT was banned in Britain in 1984
0:27:21 > 0:27:28and two years later government legislation to regulate the use of pesticides generally was introduced.
0:27:29 > 0:27:34At Harold Cooper's farm in Suffolk, his son Ashley still relies on
0:27:34 > 0:27:37a cocktail of chemicals to maintain crop yields.
0:27:37 > 0:27:43But, unlike in his father's day, the law requires him to follow a strict spraying regime.
0:27:48 > 0:27:55What we're looking for is a forecast where we've got wind speeds that are moderately low.
0:27:55 > 0:27:58We need it to be dry.
0:27:58 > 0:28:02There are certain times of the year when we can't spray if we have a frost
0:28:02 > 0:28:06and there are other times of the year when we can't spray if it's too hot.
0:28:06 > 0:28:10So the window you get can sometimes be very small.
0:28:12 > 0:28:19One of the things that irks me about the Archers is that you never hear any of the characters
0:28:19 > 0:28:22unable to get to a function because the wind has dropped
0:28:22 > 0:28:28and they've been waiting for two or three days for the wind to drop and at last they are able to go spraying!
0:28:31 > 0:28:37If we hadn't sprayed, then you might be seeing...
0:28:37 > 0:28:38mildew,
0:28:38 > 0:28:42you could on some varieties be seeing yellow rust,
0:28:42 > 0:28:48which...the Romans used to sacrifice wild dogs to protect themselves against yellow rust,
0:28:48 > 0:28:50and they also knew about mildew
0:28:50 > 0:28:54and they would sow at different times of the lunar cycle to protect themselves from mildew.
0:28:57 > 0:29:05Some of the field didn't get sprayed and we have this black grass growing here as a consequence.
0:29:06 > 0:29:15Unchecked, you would eventually have a field on which it was almost impossible to grow a winter cereal,
0:29:15 > 0:29:20because it would... despite the thinness of the stem, it has the ability
0:29:20 > 0:29:27to drain all the goodness out of the land around the wheat, and to effectively strangle the wheat.
0:29:30 > 0:29:34Ashley is visiting the annual Cereals Event.
0:29:34 > 0:29:39Conventions like this showcase the hundreds of products still available
0:29:39 > 0:29:43to both control pests and diseases and maintain soil fertility.
0:29:43 > 0:29:46It's a multi-million-pound industry.
0:29:46 > 0:29:52Farmers like Harold Cooper could have little imagined how it would grow from such modest beginnings.
0:29:52 > 0:29:58..integral storage compartment and the bare logic workstation which enables the operator to use
0:29:58 > 0:30:02all the sprayer's control functions with ease.
0:30:02 > 0:30:07The Cereals Event is the biggest in the arable farmer's year.
0:30:10 > 0:30:14On display, alongside farm equipment and agrochemicals,
0:30:14 > 0:30:17are the demonstration plots of new crop varieties.
0:30:18 > 0:30:22They bear witness to another major development of the last century,
0:30:22 > 0:30:24plant breeding.
0:30:27 > 0:30:31For many years, scientists had known that if they could engineer
0:30:31 > 0:30:35the internal genetic structure of the plant itself
0:30:35 > 0:30:38they could do much more to improve crop yields.
0:30:38 > 0:30:45But that was problematic because wheat is a synthesis of three different species.
0:30:45 > 0:30:49Its DNA is more complex than that of a human being.
0:30:50 > 0:30:52The state paid for research,
0:30:52 > 0:30:59and the government-funded Plant Breeding Institute near Cambridge was formally opened in 1955.
0:30:59 > 0:31:07And in 1977 scientists at the Institute pioneered a new, dwarf variety of wheat
0:31:07 > 0:31:11which would transform the fortunes of farmers like Oliver Cooper.
0:31:11 > 0:31:15What we're looking at here, in, say, a variety like this,
0:31:15 > 0:31:21is the sort of height of wheat that existed in the sort of '60s period and before
0:31:21 > 0:31:26and the Plant Breeding Institute identified dwarf genes
0:31:26 > 0:31:29that allowed them to breed the length of this crop down,
0:31:29 > 0:31:32which gave a stiffer, stronger straw,
0:31:32 > 0:31:35and you haven't got to be very bright to realise that
0:31:35 > 0:31:39this is going to be less likely to fall over in high wind than this.
0:31:39 > 0:31:42This is carrying bigger ears than this variety,
0:31:42 > 0:31:47and so this is one of the things plant breeding did for us.
0:31:47 > 0:31:51It gave us varieties that would stand up and produce big yields.
0:31:51 > 0:31:53I loved that time.
0:31:53 > 0:31:56For me, being a young farmer,
0:31:56 > 0:32:01my A-levels were in chemistry and, erm, botany,
0:32:01 > 0:32:04so I understood much of what was going on here
0:32:04 > 0:32:11and suddenly I'd got an industry around me that I could become very interested and part of.
0:32:11 > 0:32:13It was a golden era.
0:32:13 > 0:32:16It was a wonderful time.
0:32:21 > 0:32:26Today plant breeding is largely in the hands of commercial companies.
0:32:26 > 0:32:31The Plant Breeding Institute was disbanded in 1987.
0:32:31 > 0:32:37Bill Angus began his career there and now works for one of Europe's largest seed-development companies.
0:32:40 > 0:32:43What plant breeders have done is they've changed the design of wheat,
0:32:43 > 0:32:46so that instead of being rather tall,
0:32:46 > 0:32:51and having ears that are less fertile, that have got less seed in,
0:32:51 > 0:32:54we've now got plants which are shorter
0:32:54 > 0:32:58and have got these very fertile ears above them
0:32:58 > 0:33:02and what used to go into the stem is now going into the grain.
0:33:02 > 0:33:08Today, Bill's team are harvesting samples of grain from his test crops.
0:33:08 > 0:33:11This programme I've been involved with for 20 years
0:33:11 > 0:33:15and therefore you become very attached to it and it does become...these are your babies,
0:33:15 > 0:33:21this is your family, if you like, and like all children some disappoint you and some excite you.
0:33:21 > 0:33:25Every row in this field, and there's in the region of 200,000 of them,
0:33:25 > 0:33:28is genetically different from its adjacent row.
0:33:28 > 0:33:33This awned type has found favour in dry land situations,
0:33:33 > 0:33:36in more droughted situations, and this type of variety
0:33:36 > 0:33:42would tend to build up a micro-climate of dampness around the ear, whereas these tend not to,
0:33:42 > 0:33:45so if we keep damp, wet summers
0:33:45 > 0:33:49we'd be better off to keep these because these will dry out quicker
0:33:49 > 0:33:51and you won't get secondary diseases coming in.
0:33:51 > 0:33:57If we were to move to a dry situation then these would become more the predominant type.
0:33:57 > 0:34:02So it really is a perfect example of how plant breeders have adapted varieties
0:34:02 > 0:34:06to meet the environments that they're going to be grown in.
0:34:11 > 0:34:14Plant breeding was not without its critics.
0:34:14 > 0:34:17Together with chemicals and increasing mechanisation,
0:34:17 > 0:34:21it had led to an ever more intensive way of farming.
0:34:22 > 0:34:27Wheat yields had doubled in just one generation, but by the 1960s
0:34:27 > 0:34:31this success was putting pressure on government finances.
0:34:33 > 0:34:38The '47 Act worked very well, but it wasn't completely uncontroversial.
0:34:38 > 0:34:42Taxpayers, for example, looked at the money that was being spent on it
0:34:42 > 0:34:45and accused farmers of being what they called feather-bedded.
0:34:45 > 0:34:49On the other hand, farmers felt that they weren't always being paid
0:34:49 > 0:34:54as much as they needed to be paid, bearing in mind that they were making expensive investments,
0:34:54 > 0:34:59so they were putting a lot of inputs in every year and these things cost money.
0:35:01 > 0:35:06When a Labour government came to power in 1964, pressure grew
0:35:06 > 0:35:10to reduce the subsidies to wheat farmers like John Latham.
0:35:10 > 0:35:17In true '60s style, he joined a National Farmers Union demonstration to take their case to parliament.
0:35:20 > 0:35:24We had what was known as the Fair Deal Campaign in 1965.
0:35:24 > 0:35:30The then Minister of Agriculture, Fred Peart, said that we'd had a very fair deal
0:35:30 > 0:35:36in the price review and we didn't think we had, so we had a demonstration in London,
0:35:36 > 0:35:42where six convoys of Land Rovers, six in each convoy, went to Parliament Square to protest.
0:35:42 > 0:35:45We were nearly all arrested because it's against the law
0:35:45 > 0:35:48to demonstrate in Parliament Square when Parliament is sitting,
0:35:48 > 0:35:51also in a royal park, which is something else we didn't know.
0:35:53 > 0:35:58We decorated our combines in various posters
0:35:58 > 0:36:02and these are the boxes that contain the posters.
0:36:11 > 0:36:14The source of these conflicts between government and farmers
0:36:14 > 0:36:18was the increasing cost of subsidies to the taxpayer.
0:36:18 > 0:36:24But in 1973, when Britain joined the Common Market, the whole system changed.
0:36:25 > 0:36:31Joining the Common Market changed the way that agricultural prices were supported.
0:36:31 > 0:36:37The whole point about the Common Market was that it set up a tariff barrier
0:36:37 > 0:36:42that went round all the countries of the Common Market
0:36:42 > 0:36:48and kept low-priced world wheat out.
0:36:48 > 0:36:52The impact on wheat farmers was huge.
0:36:52 > 0:36:57Not only did it give them a massive guaranteed market, it also opened up demand for
0:36:57 > 0:37:03the type of wheat traditionally grown only in small quantities in Britain, bread-making wheat.
0:37:03 > 0:37:06Before the 1960s,
0:37:06 > 0:37:10Britain imported most of the wheat that it used for bread.
0:37:10 > 0:37:13It was Canadian hard wheat, so-called,
0:37:13 > 0:37:17which basically means that it's got a high protein content,
0:37:17 > 0:37:22and that was the wheat that we were used to using in traditional baking processes.
0:37:25 > 0:37:30Protein content is important in bread making because it enables the bread to rise.
0:37:35 > 0:37:39High protein wheat is difficult to grow in the damp British climate,
0:37:39 > 0:37:43so food producers had relied on Canadian and American wheat.
0:37:45 > 0:37:48But, faced with the higher prices imposed by the Common Market,
0:37:48 > 0:37:52they turned their attention instead to British wheat.
0:37:52 > 0:37:58And by the late 1970s, a high-speed mixing technique known as the Chorleywood Process
0:37:58 > 0:38:04had made it possible for millers to use substantial amounts of British wheat in the standard white loaf.
0:38:12 > 0:38:19The success of this development added to the demand for home-grown wheat, and output soared.
0:38:19 > 0:38:22Suddenly, in the space of a few years,
0:38:22 > 0:38:27we had gone from not having enough to having mountains of the stuff.
0:38:27 > 0:38:34And the early '80s began to see this term grain mountain, butter mountain, wine lake being used
0:38:34 > 0:38:39because all of these technologies in those industries were conspiring to
0:38:39 > 0:38:45allow us to produce much higher yields than anybody could have envisaged 10, 15 years earlier.
0:38:46 > 0:38:49Latest figures confirm Britain, like Europe,
0:38:49 > 0:38:52has a food mountain out of control.
0:38:52 > 0:38:55The food Europe doesn't want goes on piling up, and space...
0:38:55 > 0:39:01By 1988, more than five million tonnes of surplus European wheat
0:39:01 > 0:39:04was being held in storage.
0:39:04 > 0:39:08These surpluses focused the debate once again on the high price
0:39:08 > 0:39:12that Britain was paying to produce this unwanted food,
0:39:12 > 0:39:16a price that was increasingly measured in the cost to the environment.
0:39:17 > 0:39:21If you've got a big combine harvester, you don't want a two-acre field to put it in.
0:39:21 > 0:39:27So farmers tended to get rid of a lot of their hedgerows.
0:39:27 > 0:39:33Likewise, if you can get paid a lot of money for producing wheat
0:39:33 > 0:39:36and you've got a boggy bit of land then you want to drain it.
0:39:36 > 0:39:42Now, the fact that that boggy bit of land was good for nesting birds,
0:39:42 > 0:39:45or good for amphibians,
0:39:45 > 0:39:48is not something...you're not gonna get paid for that as a farmer.
0:39:48 > 0:39:54The post-war drive to produce ever more food had left its mark on the landscape.
0:39:54 > 0:39:59Hedges disappeared as fields became increasingly huge.
0:39:59 > 0:40:02The number of farms fell by more than half
0:40:02 > 0:40:07and those that remained were bigger and ever more specialised
0:40:07 > 0:40:11and the cost of maintaining this system soared.
0:40:11 > 0:40:13By the beginning of the 1990s,
0:40:13 > 0:40:20the Common Agricultural Policy absorbed over 60% of the total EU budget.
0:40:20 > 0:40:22The time for reform had come.
0:40:24 > 0:40:30In 1992, a fundamental shift in policy arrived in the shape of set-aside.
0:40:32 > 0:40:37We were paid, if you like, to take land out of production
0:40:37 > 0:40:42and that system, it can be argued, worked very well
0:40:42 > 0:40:45because it meant when we became short of food
0:40:45 > 0:40:48we put this land back into production
0:40:48 > 0:40:51and it was a good way of the government ensuring
0:40:51 > 0:40:55that land was in a fit state to farm but could be taken out.
0:40:55 > 0:40:59It was a way of regulating a certain amount of supply and demand.
0:41:02 > 0:41:08Set-aside symbolised the idea that the days of simply increasing output were over.
0:41:09 > 0:41:14What you have to do is to... see the countryside as something that can produce
0:41:14 > 0:41:18lots and lots of different things, and food is just one of them.
0:41:19 > 0:41:24By the mid-1990s, the fortunes of wheat farmers were beginning to change.
0:41:24 > 0:41:29Under pressure from food processors, the European Union had begun to
0:41:29 > 0:41:33reduce the tariffs on imported wheat.
0:41:33 > 0:41:39The protection that wheat farmers had had from global markets from the late 1930s had vanished.
0:41:39 > 0:41:44Once again, they were at the mercy of market speculation.
0:41:44 > 0:41:46128. Between 128 and 130.
0:41:48 > 0:41:50It's a global market we're trading in
0:41:50 > 0:41:54and the UK farmer is part of that global market.
0:41:54 > 0:41:58What happens in the US, what happens in Australia,
0:41:58 > 0:42:02these will have influences directly on the price the UK farmer gets paid.
0:42:04 > 0:42:07This is a wheat trading room in Lincolnshire.
0:42:07 > 0:42:12If you go back...30, 40 years,
0:42:12 > 0:42:16a lot of trading would have been done at corn exchanges around the country.
0:42:16 > 0:42:22Erm...so...what you see here is a national business.
0:42:22 > 0:42:27In those days you almost had a merchant in every town, and every town had a corn exchange
0:42:27 > 0:42:30and merchants would meet with buyers
0:42:30 > 0:42:35and they would trade face-to-face parcels of grain that they had to market.
0:42:39 > 0:42:43This is how Charles Cresswell remembers selling his wheat.
0:42:45 > 0:42:53Every Saturday during the autumn and winter we would go to the corn exchange in Berwick-on-Tweed
0:42:53 > 0:43:00and you took a sample in a little special envelope of your packet of grain.
0:43:00 > 0:43:05Then the merchant, or his representative, would look at this
0:43:05 > 0:43:10and, highly scientific, would bite it occasionally in half
0:43:10 > 0:43:16because if it bit very white and floury that was meant to be good.
0:43:16 > 0:43:24If it bit steely and blue, then that was very bad news and everybody shuffled about.
0:43:24 > 0:43:31Then you went round these people and eventually found one who would bid you a satisfactory price.
0:43:34 > 0:43:39By the 1970s, corn exchanges had become a thing of the past.
0:43:40 > 0:43:46When Charles' son, John, took over in 1992, the price that he was paid
0:43:46 > 0:43:50for his wheat was firmly in the hands of the global marketplace.
0:43:50 > 0:43:54He decided to scale back on conventional production
0:43:54 > 0:43:59and instead take advantage of government subsidies to convert to organic wheat.
0:43:59 > 0:44:06The decision to put some of our land into organic, it was an economic one, that from the late '90s
0:44:06 > 0:44:11into the early years of this century, our...
0:44:11 > 0:44:19break-even price of wheat was probably around £70 to £80 a tonne.
0:44:19 > 0:44:23And for much of that time we were being paid less than that.
0:44:23 > 0:44:26It was clearly uneconomic, we were going backwards.
0:44:26 > 0:44:28And this seemed to be a solution.
0:44:28 > 0:44:33I think it coincided with a time when the government appeared to be
0:44:33 > 0:44:36increasingly losing interest in agriculture
0:44:36 > 0:44:43- and so it was also a sensible thing to do to kind of put the farm semi to sleep.- Yes.
0:44:43 > 0:44:49And to...tier down the whole activity on the thing
0:44:49 > 0:44:55until government policy changed, which we're still looking forward to in keen anticipation.
0:45:02 > 0:45:05In Essex, the Latham family took a different route.
0:45:05 > 0:45:10The young John Latham had grown up in the era of subsidies.
0:45:10 > 0:45:15From an early age it was clear that he would be involved in farming.
0:45:18 > 0:45:22When I was 12 our combine driver went off sick with glandular fever
0:45:22 > 0:45:26and so I was put on the combine as a 12-year-old and I did the whole harvest.
0:45:26 > 0:45:29And I was just in heaven, cos that's what I enjoyed doing.
0:45:32 > 0:45:38Once John had taken charge in the 1990s, he had to find a way to survive.
0:45:42 > 0:45:45The fact that wheat is a global commodity
0:45:45 > 0:45:52means that we always have to have an eye on the global market, what's happening in the global market,
0:45:52 > 0:45:54when it comes to marketing grain
0:45:54 > 0:45:58but probably more importantly we have to be aware that we're competing in that marketplace
0:45:58 > 0:46:02and so, if there are other parts of the world that can produce wheat
0:46:02 > 0:46:04more cheaply than we are, we have to adapt to that.
0:46:04 > 0:46:06We have to be competitive.
0:46:08 > 0:46:15His strategy was strength in numbers, so he joined forces with other farmers to try to cut costs.
0:46:15 > 0:46:20What we've managed to do is to bring five or six farming businesses together
0:46:20 > 0:46:24and, while they're still trading as individual businesses,
0:46:24 > 0:46:27the actual farms are run as if it's one big farm.
0:46:30 > 0:46:36He also became Chairman of Camgrain, the UK's largest farmer's grain store co-operative.
0:46:37 > 0:46:45And, in 2007, John and his Camgrain partners struck a historic deal with a supermarket group
0:46:45 > 0:46:49to directly supply all the wheat for its in-store bakeries.
0:46:51 > 0:46:55It was the first time that a supply deal like this had been attempted
0:46:55 > 0:46:58between UK wheat farmers and a supermarket.
0:47:02 > 0:47:05Mid-August 2008.
0:47:05 > 0:47:10With the supermarket deal in place, the Cresswells' first organic crop in the ground
0:47:10 > 0:47:14and Ashley making some last-minute adjustments to his combine,
0:47:14 > 0:47:16all is set for the harvest to begin.
0:47:25 > 0:47:30It's the busiest and most crucial time of the year for the wheat farmer.
0:47:30 > 0:47:35John's come out with his father and uncle to watch the new combine in action.
0:47:35 > 0:47:39It's being driven by one of the farming partners, Andrew Tetlow.
0:47:39 > 0:47:44The weather at harvest time is absolutely critical.
0:47:44 > 0:47:47Too much rain means that the wheat can't be cut
0:47:47 > 0:47:53and, the longer it stands in the field, the less chance it has of being suitable for bread.
0:47:53 > 0:47:58John Latham's supermarket deal relies on their having a good harvest.
0:47:58 > 0:48:01Without it, the financial consequences could be severe.
0:48:04 > 0:48:08This is a bread-making variety so we're very keen to get it in
0:48:08 > 0:48:13before the quality deteriorates and it'll be downgraded to a feed grain.
0:48:13 > 0:48:19And this year we're looking at the difference between a £30 premium over the feed price and not.
0:48:19 > 0:48:22When you have catchy weather like this, it's very important
0:48:22 > 0:48:26that we go out and get the quality, and we've got contracts to fill.
0:48:30 > 0:48:34For Ashley Cooper, harvest is almost spiritual.
0:48:35 > 0:48:40Harvest has an aura about it that pulls you in and consumes you
0:48:40 > 0:48:43because it's on harvest that the whole of human civilisation is built.
0:48:43 > 0:48:49For about 330 days of the year I feel very insignificant and very small
0:48:49 > 0:48:55but when we start harvest I actually feel I'm the most important person in the world. I really do.
0:48:55 > 0:49:01For the rest of the year I feel that my knees shake if I say boo to a goose. That's how you feel!
0:49:09 > 0:49:12In the South, the weather is holding
0:49:12 > 0:49:16and Ashley Cooper and John Latham are making a start,
0:49:16 > 0:49:20but for the Cresswells in Northumberland it's a different story.
0:49:20 > 0:49:24Rain has begun to delay the harvest and has damaged the combine.
0:49:26 > 0:49:28Do you see that wear plate underneath?
0:49:32 > 0:49:37We've been running quite well for the last four days but we got about
0:49:37 > 0:49:43half an inch yesterday afternoon and another shower this morning,
0:49:43 > 0:49:45so we won't be going for a wee while.
0:49:46 > 0:49:51The Cresswells' organic wheat is like the Latham's, a bread-making variety,
0:49:51 > 0:49:56and every day of wet weather during the harvest increases the risk that it will be ruined.
0:50:02 > 0:50:03The rain has spread south.
0:50:03 > 0:50:08August 2008 is turning out to be one of the wettest on record.
0:50:11 > 0:50:16Even the supermarket combine on the Latham farm in Essex has ground to a halt.
0:50:16 > 0:50:21John's partner, Andrew Tetlow, is powerless.
0:50:21 > 0:50:25You can see that the weather has beaten us. We have great machinery and all the technology
0:50:25 > 0:50:29that you could actually want but if it's raining we have to stop.
0:50:29 > 0:50:34Er...this stuff is what we're trying to put through the combine
0:50:34 > 0:50:37and when it's wet it just will not go.
0:50:37 > 0:50:40You know, the straw is absolutely sodden. It will not cut.
0:50:40 > 0:50:44It gets very difficult to actually rub the grain out when it's wet,
0:50:44 > 0:50:46so we can't get a very good sample.
0:50:46 > 0:50:49It will just absolutely crucify the machine.
0:50:53 > 0:50:59It's been wet all day and wet for the last two weeks nearly
0:50:59 > 0:51:02and day by day the crops are beginning their natural process
0:51:02 > 0:51:06of germinating and eventually falling onto the ground
0:51:06 > 0:51:11and, every day that goes by, you're losing the potential for a maximum harvest.
0:51:11 > 0:51:15So you need to grab every opportunity that you can get.
0:51:15 > 0:51:19It's not dissimilar to something like being the Battle Of Britain,
0:51:19 > 0:51:22when you get an opportunity you have to go for it.
0:51:28 > 0:51:32But when the rain holds off the farmers are out day and night.
0:51:32 > 0:51:36Everything is sacrificed to get the crop harvested.
0:52:06 > 0:52:11All John Latham's wheat goes to the huge silos of the grain store co-operative.
0:52:12 > 0:52:16Here the wheat will be tested, dried and stored.
0:52:20 > 0:52:24Do you know where you're going, Dick? Do you know where you're going?
0:52:24 > 0:52:31Camgrain Managing Director Philip Darke has the complex task of co-ordinating the grain deliveries.
0:52:31 > 0:52:36Harvest is late, everyone got stopped with the wet weather, so they're all going together.
0:52:36 > 0:52:39We've got to get this quality crop in
0:52:39 > 0:52:43so they've just got the throttles open on these big combines.
0:52:43 > 0:52:47Right, you want to go to Thomas Banks...
0:52:47 > 0:52:49to Manor Farm...
0:52:49 > 0:52:54This is where all the Camgrain farmers are. Haverhill, Cambridge, we're down to Ipswich, and really
0:52:54 > 0:53:00we're picking up from almost the whole membership all on the same day. MOBILE RINGS
0:53:00 > 0:53:01Philip Darke.
0:53:02 > 0:53:04Yeah, we can sort him, no problem.
0:53:07 > 0:53:12As each lorry arrives, a probe burrows down to take a sample from the load.
0:53:15 > 0:53:19Then the grain goes to the laboratory for a battery of tests.
0:53:21 > 0:53:26Elasticity, moisture and protein levels are all crucial,
0:53:26 > 0:53:30key to the wheat being accepted as the more profitable bread wheat,
0:53:30 > 0:53:34or being downgraded to the less profitable animal feed wheat.
0:53:37 > 0:53:44Moisture 19.16, protein 12.96, hardness 49.8, 76.4, weight.
0:53:44 > 0:53:48This is a testing time for the Camgrain farmers.
0:53:48 > 0:53:52The deal with the supermarket depends on their wheat being
0:53:52 > 0:53:55of the right quality for the instore bakeries.
0:53:55 > 0:54:02The longer the harvest takes, the greater the chance that the wheat won't make the grade.
0:54:02 > 0:54:06We want to get the job done. We had 60,000 tonnes in until yesterday.
0:54:06 > 0:54:08We're going to take in over 200,000.
0:54:08 > 0:54:11So you can see there's a long way to go yet.
0:54:13 > 0:54:16The more days we have like this, sooner it's finished.
0:54:34 > 0:54:39In the end, the fortunes of the three farmers in the 2008 harvest varied.
0:54:39 > 0:54:45In Suffolk, the weather held and Ashley Cooper was able to harvest a good crop.
0:54:45 > 0:54:53Farming has to be one of the most gambling-orientated jobs that you can do.
0:54:53 > 0:54:56Everything from deciding whether to come out and combine
0:54:56 > 0:55:02to the day when you sell your corn, which may fluctuate in price by 50% to 60%, and this year even more,
0:55:02 > 0:55:07you are taking risk decisions every day of the year.
0:55:10 > 0:55:14In these tougher economic times, the government's environmental schemes
0:55:14 > 0:55:17have been a welcome addition to Ashley's farm.
0:55:17 > 0:55:22In total we have about 10% of our arable acreage
0:55:22 > 0:55:27now in environmental schemes of one sort or another.
0:55:27 > 0:55:34What this means is that we have six-metre margins, planted with a variety of grasses,
0:55:34 > 0:55:38and in some cases wild flowers, around each field.
0:55:38 > 0:55:42I've been able to replant the wood that my father removed.
0:55:42 > 0:55:48I'm very lucky, because I love it, and it has added a new dimension to the farm
0:55:48 > 0:55:53and it's given a new injection of enthusiasm to part of my farming career.
0:56:01 > 0:56:07For John Latham and his partners, the 2008 harvest was a success.
0:56:07 > 0:56:10- Where's your bakery smell? You can't smell the bakery.- No. You used to.
0:56:10 > 0:56:15- What it does, it pipes through the front door.- Oh, so it's all disappeared up that end.
0:56:15 > 0:56:18Their wheat was good enough for the supermarket contract.
0:56:18 > 0:56:21I think it's fantastic, you know.
0:56:21 > 0:56:27It's two years of hard work to get Sainsbury's to have British farmers here,
0:56:27 > 0:56:31extolling the virtue of British wheat and British flour.
0:56:31 > 0:56:34It's a shame that it was taken when the wheat was still green.
0:56:34 > 0:56:38It would probably have been better in August time.
0:56:38 > 0:56:42But, no, it's... I'm quite happy with it!
0:56:45 > 0:56:50In Northumberland, Charles Cresswell and his son John were not so lucky.
0:56:50 > 0:56:53The weather played havoc with the harvest
0:56:53 > 0:56:57and their organic wheat was not good enough for bread-making.
0:56:57 > 0:57:03We had nearly six inches of rain in August, which is a crucial time for wheat quality.
0:57:03 > 0:57:08Then in early September this was topped off
0:57:08 > 0:57:12with nearly another six inches on a single weekend,
0:57:12 > 0:57:17which really finished matters in terms of our harvest quality.
0:57:19 > 0:57:20The wheat can go for feed.
0:57:20 > 0:57:23It's very frustrating because that's not what you grew it for.
0:57:23 > 0:57:27You've lost a sizable part of your income
0:57:27 > 0:57:30but, as my little daughter said,
0:57:30 > 0:57:34"If you can't take a joke, Daddy, you shouldn't be farming."
0:57:34 > 0:57:36And she's right!
0:57:40 > 0:57:47The last 80 years have seen these farming families adapt to change on an unprecedented scale.
0:57:47 > 0:57:51New technologies and science, war,
0:57:51 > 0:57:55political storms and economic upheavals,
0:57:55 > 0:57:57but what of the future?
0:58:00 > 0:58:04I find it terribly easy to look back but awful difficult to look forward!
0:58:08 > 0:58:12Anybody who has to compete with the British weather has to,
0:58:12 > 0:58:16I think, be sympathised with to some extent.
0:58:16 > 0:58:20But nobody forced us to be farmers
0:58:20 > 0:58:25and, er...we do it because we... we love it.
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