38 BESWICK HALL FEB / MAR 2023 • farmers-mart . co . uk
KEEPING VOCAL ON BEHALF OF HIS FELLOW FARMERS
Chris Berry talks with John Duggleby of Beswick Hall
USING his voice on behalf of his fellow farmers has seen East Riding farmer John Duggleby of Beswick Hall pick up another award to add to his Ronnie Mounfield Award presented by the Driffield Agricultural Society in 2018 . This time John has been presented with an NFU Community Farming Hero Award for his work over many years on the Beverley & North Holderness Drainage Board , including 15 years as chairman .
John is also a former county chairman of East Riding NFU and has held several positions in the National Farmers Union , including that of county treasurer for over 30 years , Tenants Northern Representative on the headquarters committee and deputy delegate to headquarters . He has also been an active member of the Royal Agricultural Benevolent Institution ( RABI ) for the last 30 years .
It ’ s quite a resume ! And you feel that another major award , given the ones he has already received may well be on the horizon .
While John may not be holding the reins any longer he is as tenacious as ever over how he approached his roles and what he still feels needs actioning today .
“ I ’ ve been very vociferous in campaigning to get the River Hull to exit water the way it should and so that the pumps can work properly instead of all this continuous flooding we ’ ve had four years out of every ten , almost half the years this century .
“ Drainage of the River Hull has gone into dereliction now . The River Hull has never been cleaned out and there is a lot more fast run-off from the land because it has all been drained properly for agricultural reasons .
“ The Wolds spills spring water down from the hills and that can suddenly come into the river . They ( Environment Agency ) don ’ t take account of that and that ’ s what has been causing the flooding . As that water is coming out of the high level water channels into the lowland system that water has to be pumped out again . It ’ s not right that these lads are getting flooded . You can ’ t put a figure on the loss of agricultural production .
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