Jordi Pellicer left the livestock more than a decade ago, in 2009. In 1976, his father bought the farm where he later worked, in Lobster. The situation in the sector led him to take a different path in his working life and rent the farm. 14 years after his change he sees with difficulty the future of the sector. “Livestock have a maximum lifespan of 10 or 15 years, at least in Llagostera. The peasantry may still endure with macrograngesbut what is livestock farming will all disappear”, he says.
He says that “the sector is very bad” and “there is no one that the children want to follow”. In addition, consider that there are no facilities for young people who would like to dedicate themselves to farming. “My eldest daughter, who is 22 years old, would like to start the cow farm again, but it is not possible, it is unfeasible”, he explains. “The price of milk is at the price it is, everything has gone up a lot and there is a lot of bureaucracy, a lot of permits that you have to comply with”, he adds.
John Jordanfarmer in the cattle sector a Bellcaire d’Empordà, assures that “the sector is screwed”. Voice with difficulty the generational relief. “I, for example, have two girls and they will not continue with the profession. Also, the young man who wants to follow he gets grants that are ridiculous. If a tractor is worth at least 150,000 euros, if a cow milking robot is worth 150,000 euros, there is a lot of speculation with land and you can’t buy it…” he explains. In addition, Jordà calls for intervention to ensure the future of the sector. “Neither the Union of Farmers nor the administration, no one does anything for the sector”, he says.
Future with “hope”
In contrast, some voices in the sector see the future of this with better eyes. Jordi Armengol, head of Livestock Sectors of the Union of Farmers, says that they believe there is “hope”. He defends that “if the population grows at the rate it has been doing in recent years, our job will be even more important”. However, he admits that there are problems within the sector such as the “production model or the model social».
Regarding the generational shift in farming, Armengol considers that “the new generations understand the approach to life differently”, in addition, he says that “it is difficult for someone to join the sector without heritage, such as a farm, and this it usually goes from parents to children.”
L’cost increase is one of the topics that hovers over livestock, a fact that considerably reduces the profit margin of farmers. However, the war in Ukraine has not been the only trigger. “We already had an increase in the costs of the same primes of approximately 20% before the war”, he says James Bernis, head of JARC’s pork sector. However, he admits that as a result of the war this increase “doubles” and some raw materials such as feed or energy have become more expensive by around 44% in one year.
From Unió de Pagesos they defend that this situation should make the population think. “Until now we were eating at a very cheap price and if we want to go back to that it could cause difficulties for the sector to survive”, says Jordi Armengol. “The increase in prices should make us think about where the food we have in supermarkets or butchers comes from, there is a job behind all this”, he adds.