Malins for website 10/01/2011 14:40 Page 189
Chapter 16 Over the years the outlook for farming slowly improved. In 2007 milk prices suddenly increased substantially, which at last restored confidence in milk production. A shortage of milk in the UK would have forced us to import milk from the continent, when we would have been at the mercy of European producers and suffered all the expense of transporting milk in refrigerated lorries from France or Holland. Corn prices went up at about the same time, so we were finally able to reap the rewards of all our investment in land. By the end of the 20th Century we were at last providing a fair living for myself and my sons. This achievement pleased Daphne greatly, since she had played such a huge part in making it possible. She said she had never imagined that one day she would be in a partnership which owned more than 500 acres of land. Her father had been a first-rate farmer himself, but he was a tenant who had had to move from one farm to another. When he died at 71 his last tenancy had ended, so that was the end of farming for the Dickins family. I’m sure Daphne’s father would have been delighted to see how successful she became after his lifetime. I owe a lot to Daphne. It was a great sadness when she died in December 2008.
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