01/04/09

Care Farming in Wales: The Future

The future growth of care farming in Wales was under the spotlight at a special meeting in April

Care farming is not a new concept in certain countries in mainland Europe and for some years, farmers in countries such as the Netherlands, Norway and Italy have taken progressive steps combining farming with care of people who have a disability or are socially disadvantaged.

There are also care farms, large and small, in the UK, which have been in running for many years, but with little recognition.

National Care Farming Initiative (NCFI) coordinator Debbie Wilcox, who is based at Harper Adams University College, Shropshire, says: “Care farming develops best as a partnership and in parts of the UK local and regional groups have been coming together to promote and develop care farming in their area, raise awareness and encourage the development of more care farms.

“We would really like such a group to promote and support the development of care farming in Wales and we’d like to initiate it with the support of a range of organisations, businesses and individuals.

“We are convinced that care farming is self-evidently a very good idea, but we realise that to make it work in Wales we need to take a strategic approach to building the evidence base and developing a group in a way that will be most useful to farmers, practitioners and policymakers.”

The meeting took place at Amelia Trust, a care farm near Barry, Glamorgan.

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