Seymour may have been a self styled self sufficiency guru, but farmer he was not. He made his money from writing. Real farmers make their money from farming. This dictates they use techniques to maximise growth and hence returns.
   If they did not you would likely starve.


Barley is the second largest arable crop in the UK (after wheat). It remains an important cereal because of its ability to survive in cold and wet conditions, so although it is grown throughout most of the UK, in the north, where growing conditions are most difficult for wheat, it is often the dominant arable crop.

Of the 6.5 million tonnes produced in the UK each year approximately 2 million tonnes are malted by the brewing and distilling trades. About 1.5 million tonnes are exported for the same purpose, often to countries like China that have developed the western taste for beer. The remaining 3 tonnes, i.e. almost half of what we grow, is used for animal feed
The UK is one of few countries in the world that has grown its barley area in the past few decades, with the global barley area declining by 23% in the past 20 years.

More than 93% of malting barley globally is used for beer production, but half the UK crop is used for distilling, feeding the expanding Scottish whisky sector, which is expected to use 1m tonnes of malting barley annually by 2020.

The other half supplies domestic brewers such as Carling brewer Molson Coors, but also underpins exports to maltsters in Europe, who rely on British growers in the south of England to iron out supply deficits from growers on the Continent.