By the middle of February, NFU Scotland will have its own, bespoke history.
The First Hundred Years: The Story Of NFU Scotland is not an official history written to represent the agreed view of the union. Rather it is an independently commissioned work from Andrew Arbuckle, a former farming editor of The Courier, dealing chronologically with selected themes over the last century over 152 pages.
The establishment of the union, in Glasgow in 1913, was prompted by the compelling need to improve farmers’ share of the money paid by the customer for milk.
That sore was to run throughout the ensuing century.
It is sobering to think that in 2005 92 years on farming leaders had no option but to point again to the yawning chasm between the prices of farm produce in the shops compared with the field price.
Milk was retailing at 54p a litre compared to a farm price of 18p. Growers received £95 a tonne for potatoes while supermarkets sold them at £550, with the gap between farm and shop prices for beef £2.30 a kg.
Little wonder farmers took to the street periodically to make their case.
The struggle will go on into the next century.
Over the piece NFU Scotland has been engaged politically to reduce red tape; lessen the burden of legislation; deal with CAP reform; argue for livestock on the hills against forestry; influence the wider land use debate, and face the pain of the irreconcilable tenancy headache.
The first hundred years represents an evolutionary journey encapsulated in the perpetual challenge of giving expression to the place and function of the farmer in Scottish society.
The union has unreservedly held centre stage in speaking up for its diverse and, at times, divided membership.
Finding a single solution is not easy in any membership organisation, but the union has achieved considerable consensus and held itself together by the results of its focused and persistent pursuit of the interests of the industry as a whole.
All these varied factors are brought out in this slim, but valuable volume.
It offers tantalising glimpses, as well as detailed considerations on what the union is about, what it has achieved and where it has fallen down.
Drawing extensively from the pages of the Farming Leader, discussions with office bearers and reference to the organisation’s minutes, Andrew Arbuckle has marshalled illuminating insights into one of Scotland’s most effective lobbying organisations.
In particular, he has teased out some of the subtle changes in the union’s approach to a changing world and detected strands that have become central tenets of the union.
Its pioneering role in food promotion is one.
In 1962 Gordon Baxter of Baxters of Fochabers related the story of a farmer who told him: “It’s our job to produce food, not to sell it.”
Within five years, the Scottish Quality Lamb Association, chaired by the union’s livestock convener Morgan Milne, was formed to promote lamb, leading to the establishment of the Scottish Quality Beef and Lamb Association, and subsequently QMS.
The union also supported Food from Britain, and ushered in a new era of farm assurance for pigs and cereals.
This represented a novel and ambitious way of thinking that has endured, and marked a departure from blinkered and insular attitudes.
It was paralleled by a growing awareness of the need for effective communication internally and with the wider public to define agriculture as a key player and a major economic driver in modern Scotland.
The Glasgow Garden Festival in 1988, which attracted more than one million visitors, was a singular breakthrough in upping the union’s game, particularly around the Scottish Educational Farm.
The period between the 1970s and now has created a well defined framework and allowed, in the words of the author, a distinction between the “significant” and the “ephemeral” events that contribute to this book.
This is a matter of judgment, and Andrew Arbuckle suggests developments in the present time are more difficult to select.
But the thematic approach to the story of the union triumphs in taking the reader through time and showing a clear pattern of change and adaptation.
The book shows no signs of flagging when dealing with the 21st Century, not least the impact of the environmental lobby, the ever-growing power of the supermarkets and the presence of political drivers from Edinburgh, London and Brussels.
The last point has not been lost on union president Nigel Miller, who observes it is “too easy to forget the EU has sheltered us from some domestic politicians that had no vision beyond the city of London”.