DAMAGING repercussions of the new farm subsidy system look set to be felt more keenly in Pembrokeshire than in any other Welsh county.

Pembrokeshire has a high concentration of big, productive lowland farms and it is these that are the major losers in the switch to flat rate payments.

Farmers attending the Pembrokeshire County NFU Cymru Conference at Llandissilio said tapering discriminated against larger holdings while many so-called ‘hobby’ farmers farming less than 54 hectares would receive artificially high payments.

Mansel Raymond, who farms 3,400 acres in north Pembrokeshire, said lowland farmers would be hit the hardest – but not just because of cuts to their Basic Payment Scheme income.

Pembrokeshire has one of the highest incidences of bovine TB in Wales and moves are also afoot to designate a large swathe of the county as a Nitrate Vulnerable Zone (NVZ).

“Pembrokeshire is being dealt a triple blow,’’ said Mr Raymond.

Andrew Slade, Director of Agriculture in the Food and Marine department at Welsh Government and a speaker at the meeting, point out that there had been no reduction in the level of CAP funding coming into Wales.

He admitted that the judicial review which had resulted in the scrapping of the proposed area-based scheme had “created chaos’’ and that the Welsh Government had no choice but to opt for flat rate payments.

Mr Slade suggested that cases of bovine TB appeared to be rising only because surveillance had improved. He dismissed the success of pilot badger culls in England as “anecdotal’’.

Farmers incomes had been hit by bovine TB and subsidy cuts and if the government pressed ahead with the NVZ designations in Pembrokeshire, it would have serious financial and practical implications for their businesses, said Mr Raymond.

This move would impose restrictions on the timing and rate of fertiliser and manure applications and also affect stocking densities. Many would also have to invest tens of thousands of pounds in new slurry storage facilities.

Pembrokeshire County NFU Cymru Chairman Walter Simon said it was another burden for hard-pressed farmers who did not have money spare to comply with this legislation. “Policy needs to be outcome-based, not risk-based,’’ he insisted.