It was a pleasure to attend the recent Usk agricultural show. This is not just an important day in the calendar for the farming sector in Monmouthshire but it has become one of the largest one-day agricultural shows in the whole of the UK. It’s an opportunity for farmers to take a step back from the busy job, meet up and socialise. It also presents an opportunity for politicians to take the temperature of the agricultural sector by speaking to as many people as possible. I attended the show alongside my Senedd colleague Llyr Gruffydd who is the Plaid Cymru spokesperson for Rural Affairs.

From speaking to farming unions and ordinary farmers, things may have calmed down a little in the last year following the announcement by the Labour Government on the sustainable farming scheme, but the picture is not all rosy. For example, there remains much concern over the impact of Westminster’s changes to inheritance tax will have on the family farm in Wales.

One of the main topics for discussions was TB and the work of the Technical Advisory Group on Bovine TB. There is an eagerness within the sector to see the Labour Government in Wales commit to fully accepting and implementing the forthcoming recommendations of the Technical Advisory Group on Bovine TB to demonstrate a recognition of the urgency to tackle this long-standing disease. There is also a desire among farmers to see the group’s advice is published transparently and without delay. Farmers want the findings developed into practical policies that deliver measurable progress and stability for the sector. This is something I was able to put to the Labour Rural Affairs Minister in plenary and he insisted in reply that the government has a track record of acting “rapidly” on recommendations.

In between meetings, it was lovely to stroll around the show and see the amazing local produce on offer. Wales has become well known for its produce and we should be rightly proud of the food and drink sector we have developed. Plaid Cymru would like to see this sector grown further through improved public procurement within Wales itself. This is something that European countries do much better, which provides a huge boost to their economy. Within the UK, Scotland has a much better public procurement rate than Wales and this is something that Wales should try to match at least. So far, the Labour Government in Wales has been reluctant to set targets but this needs to change if we are to create the much-needed thousands of jobs we are missing out on through poor public procurement rates.