Iran Ceasefire benefits still uncertain for Kent farmers
The cost of fuel may be going down, but farmers are still feeling the hit.
Kent farmers say that though the decrease in fuel prices brought on by the ceasefire in Iran is a good start, they're still sceptical for the affordability of farming.
Oil, fertiliser and fuel prices spiked after the Iran oil crisis began, but costs began to decrease after a two week ceasefire was announced yesterday.
Hugh Richards is a farmer based near Ashford, and NFU Regional Livestock Board Vice Chair. He told us how Kent farmers were feeling:
"The hope is that the prices go right back down to where they were, but the likelihood of that isn't very great.
"You look at history repeating itself, it never goes back down as far as it should, and it always takes a lot longer to go back. And we're at the time of the year when lot of farmers are really busy burning diesel because this is the time of the year you get out in the field and do your spring work. So it's having a huge influence on what's going on."
He added that one farmer had confided in him recently that the amount of fertilizer they'd spread in a day would require a purchase of £90,000 at the current prices to replace.
"The price it got up to, it wasn't economically viable to plant the crops. And if you've got a crop in the ground you have to make the decision 'am I just going to take a hit on it and take what comes?'
"Without fertilizer it will be a fraction of what yield would be with fertilizer, but it might be more profitable to sell the fertilizer than it is to grow the crop.
"Well that's absurd."
"We're not going to get an increase in our products. We're price takers, not price makers. And I'm afraid that is the crux of the problem."
Looking forward he warned that if another international incident were to damage crops and livestock, there could be an increase in mental health issues for the farming community, which needs support. While shops could see less food on the shelves towards the end of the year.