Farming and Agriculture

Farming and Agriculture Icon

WE CAN ADVISE ON A WIDE RANGE OF ISSUES RELATING TO COMMERCIAL FARMING AND AGRICULTURE.

We support many Suffolk farming and agriculture businesses. Some of the issues which crop up time and again are:

Farm Partnership Agreements

If your farming business is operated as a traditional partnership, these agreements can help with its smooth running. They can deal with matter such as:

– Identifying partnership assets v assets of a particular partner

– How partners join and leave the partnership

– How partners are remunerated

– How capital is treated and may be removed

– Decision making in the partnership. Which key decisions should be made unanimously

– Who has authority to operate the farm partnership’s bank account

– Who has authority to enter into contracts

– How disputes should be handled

– What triggers the dissolution of the partnership

Farm partnership agreements are pretty flexible and can usually cover matters of particular importance to the individual farming business.

If there isn’t a farm partnership agreement in place, the default is that the Partnership Act 1890 applies. This has some fairly unwanted consequences, such as the partnership dissolving each time a partner leaves or dies.

Farm succession planning

The Partnership Agreement can also help with farm succession planning.

By identifying what are partnership assets and what are individual assets this can help with tax planning.

By clearly stating that the partnership does not dissolve when a partner leaves or dies this can help demonstrate to banks and suppliers that the business is continuing and the continuing partners can continue to operate the business.

We work closely with our colleagues in our Private Client and Agricultural Property Teams in order to achieve good outcomes for our farming clients.

Farm business demerger or restructuring

Sometimes a business has been passed down through the generations which means that family lines starts to diverge. Siblings or cousins may wish to operate different parts of the business in different ways. We work with the business and their accountants to put in place a tax efficient structure for a demerger or reorganisation of the farming business.

Supply Agreements and arrangements

These are both supply agreements to the farm business and also supply of the farm’s produce. We can help produce clear and understandable terms or we can help you to decipher the legal jargon.


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Key Contacts

Victoria Spellman
Partner 
01473‍ 350573
Clare Richards
Partner 
01473‍ 617311