I will try to be as brief as possible. In our most recent rural Scotland in focus report, we suggested that we need to think about what our overall rural policy or development objectives are that agriculture ties into. Agriculture is not all rural development—an awful lot of other business takes place—and we need an overarching rural policy before we consider what we do with ag policy. As Jonnie Hall says, the amount that farmers spend is incredibly important not only to the rural economy, but to the wider economy. They spend an awful lot.
On the basic principles, no matter how you read the EU situation, CAP will become much more outcomes focused to deliver for the environment and for climate change. It looks as though smallholders will be given a bigger chunk of money because of their role in maintaining the countryside and populations in remote areas.
Moving to that outcomes-based approach to make the farming sector or ag policy more justifiable to the taxpayer presents a fundamental challenge to us here in the UK. That is because the EU currently dictates where the money goes and decides how much CAP money comes into all the countries; it dictates that agriculture is important. Under Brexit, we will have to justify to the taxpayer why we should continue to support agriculture, so it will be essential to ensure that those outcomes are explicit in our policy.
It is important that we have a more resilient sector. Some of the stuff that we have been doing shows that there are a lot of non-viable businesses in the farming sector. An awful lot of evidence suggests that hill farmers are not reinvesting in their businesses, so the condition of their buildings is becoming poorer.
11:15
Pete Ritchie is absolutely right that we have some real champions of agriculture in this country. Some of the top producers are real go-getters. They are agribusiness. I am not convinced that we are ever going to shorten this tail that everybody keeps talking about. The statistics show that 20 per cent of the people with sheep in Scotland control 80 per cent of the sheep, 20 per cent of the holdings with beef control 80 per cent of the beef, and 20 per cent of those who have cereal holdings control 80 per cent of the cereals. If we are talking about food production, we are therefore largely talking about 20 per cent of the holdings. If we are talking about a wider agricultural policy that supports farmers, crofters and smallholders, we have to think about different objectives. Perhaps we need to start thinking about what we actually want out of an agricultural policy.
On getting more of the retail value for the farmer, working with organisations such as the Scottish Agricultural Organisation Society is essential. We need more co-operation. Some of the co-operatives at work in Scotland have shown that, through co-operation, our sector can make significant gains in profitability.
Everyone talks about the value of Scottish food and drink to the economy, and most of that is to do with whisky. Why is there no concordat of agreement between the barley producers and the whisky sector that the sector will, where possible, make sure that it sources Scottish barley? Such an approach would not be hugely innovative, but we need collective action. Getting such action is difficult because, as a sector, agriculture—particularly mainstream agriculture—has been pretty poor at coming together. In the pig sector, the poultry sector and the fruit or horticulture sector, which have historically not been supported, we have seen much more co-operation.