15.09.26 Calls for a rural reset, how to harvest small scale arable, dairy co-operative.

The former Labour Home Secretary David Blunkett has told the government to 'reset' it's rural policy, and 'learn from its mistakes' with inheritance tax. Speaking at an event launching the Countryside Alliance's 'Campaign for The Countryside', he said the government should also “set aside pro­pos­als to ban trail hunt­ing” and he warned that “for our coun­tryside to be sus­tain­able, it requires a listen­ing gov­ern­ment.” We speak to the former NFU President Minette Batters who was also at the launch.

Over the summer you've probably seen the massive combine harvesters crawling across the fields to cut grain, but what if you’ve got a very small patch of cereal crops, how do you harvest it? Most contractors with combines won’t even look at a couple of acres, so what do you do? A community farm near Edinburgh has been struggling to find answers.

All week we're taking a closer look at farming co-ops. They're usually formed of a group of farmers so they have more clout when selling their products, they also share information with each other about benchmarking and new innovations. Arla Foods is the biggest producer of dairy products in the UK and Europe's largest dairy co-operative. Its 9,000 multi-national farmer-owners not only share in the profits, but play an active role in deciding how the business is run. We visit farmers who're part of it on a Cumbrian dairy farm in the Eden valley.

Presenter = Anna Hill
Producer = Rebecca Rooney