Plaid Cymru hopefuls Cefin Campbell and Nerys Evans who are seeking to represent the new Sir Gaerfyrddin seat in Cardiff Bay, were taken through a range of priority policy issues from NFU Cymru’s Growing Forward Senedd elections manifesto, focussing on TB, water quality, regulatory review and the Sustainable Farming Scheme, issues which are hot topics in a rural seat where agriculture plays a huge role in the local economy and community.
Matter of urgency
Haydn described the current Water Quality Regulations as blunt, inefficient, and bureaucratic, imposing high costs on the industry and giving rise to unintended consequences.
Mr Evans impressed upon the candidates the need to revisit the current regulations as a matter of urgency if their party is in government after 7 May, alongside a more general plea for the establishment of an independent review group to examine the cumulative burden of red-tape and bureaucracy on Welsh agriculture.
TB turmoil
With TB continuing to devastate farming businesses in Carmarthenshire, Haydn also took the opportunity to talk about the impact it was having on farmers and their families, particularly the financial and emotional impacts of a TB breakdown.
With over 11,000 cattle having been slaughtered in Wales in 2025, the Union’s message to the candidates was the need for a comprehensive TB eradication strategy which actively tackles the disease in all its vectors including wildlife, alongside the current cattle control and surveillance measures and biosecurity protocols.
Stability should be key
Against the backdrop of a world which appears to increasingly unstable, and where input costs continue to soar, Mr Evans made the case for support payments to farmers citing the stability such payments provide for farming businesses, something which in turn underpins domestic food production and helps secure the future family farms, our rural communities, language and culture.
The need to maintain the 70:30 split within the SFS between the Universal, and Optional and collaborative layers was also impressed upon Cefin and Nerys, with the importance of revisiting the agricultural support budget, which has been cash-flat since 2013, and brining it into line with inflation also highlighted with both.
Concluding Mr Evans said ‘I am grateful to Cefin and Nerys for coming out to farm today for a useful discussion on a range of topics. I know NFU Cymru stands ready to work with whoever is elected to Cardiff Bay and whoever forms the next Welsh Government to ensure that we have the best possible policy environment for Welsh agriculture to thrive.
