POLITICAL party conferences - particularly those of the one in power - attract protesters and interest groups like moths to a lamp, but this weekend Labour will find it hard to ignore the vocal pressure directed at them by farmers marching at Blackpool.

For while they are only another group, like the trade unions and manufacturers who are growing critical of the government's handling of the economy, the farmers deserve to be singled out for attention.

To begin with, their economic plight has gone on longer and reaches deeper than many other sectors, not least because of the enduring crisis that the BSE disaster has brought to the livestock sector both at home and in export markets.

Now, we see sheep farmers brought to the point of desperation as auction prices see lambs selling for less than the price of a bale of hay and for a fraction of the price it costs to rear them.

It is a recipe for ruin, not just for individual farmers, but for the vital industry of agriculture itself.

Yet, it is not only farmers' livelihoods that are under threat, the whole rural community is under pressures that the government ought to relieve.

If anything dented Labour's self-assurance in government, it was the massive Countryside March in London earlier this year when the concerns of country dwellers, triggered by the threat to field sports, were firmly brought home to those at Westminster.

These included the desperate housing situation in rural areas - one that has pushed up prices beyond the affordability of country people and led to population decline and the run-down of services, ranging from transport to shops.

In short, the crisis means people are finding it harder - impossible even - to make a living in the country and to live there.

The farmers' march at Blackpool on Sunday is not just another protest march.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.