AN AWARD-winning farmer has decided to leave East Lancashire for America after giving up on making a living from agriculture in the UK.

Ian Townson, 29, has been in farming since he left school, and currently rents space on a farm near Gisburn.

But he has become so disillusioned with the agricultural industry in this country he has taken a job in North Carolina working for American food giant Smithfield Foods, where he will be a trainee manager on a giant pig farm.

And Mr Townson, who moves with his wife, Hannah, from their home in Clitheroe said he had no regrets, and he was forced to choose between working oversees or finding a new job in England.

He said: "Had agriculture been sailing along in this country I would have stayed. We started looking elsewhere when it started to get difficult to make ends meet.

"We've done all right but if you want to do better than that you need to look elsewhere, that's what we've found. There's opportunity to progress whereas in this country the opportunity to progress within agriculture is considerably more limited.

"A lot of farms are run by families and if your family doesn't happen to own its own farm you're not going to get in.

"People living in cities are getting more wealthy and are able to afford a country house. We cannot compete with the kind of money they are bringing into the country now.

"People buy an old barn and convert it. We can't get that kind of money to buy a farm and make a living. To get a farm together with suitable stock on it and make a good living on it you need a million pounds.

"It's a shame we have to leave home but at the same time if you get an opportunity you have to take it.

"You get a lot of people complaining about the state of British farming. If you don't think it's good don't stay here criticising it if you're not prepared to make the push and try something else."

Mr Townson, whose father is also a farmer, has a visa for three years, but is planning to stay even longer if he is happy with the job.

He recently sold a cow for a record price at the Christmas Prime Cattle Show in Gisburn and also scooped first prize in the show.

To train to become a farmer he attended Myerscough College, then Harper Adams University College, a specialist agricultural college in Shropshire, and as part of the course worked America.