A Green MEP for the South West has warned that family farms could disappear from the area if the UK leaves the Single Market.

Dr Molly Scott Cato, who sits on the Agricultural Committee in the European Parliament, believes that in the absence of a new trade deal with Europe outside the Single Market, the UK would revert to WTO trade rules which could prove disastrous.

Under WTO trading rules tariffs would be imposed on around 90 per cent by value of the UK's exports to the EU, which accounts for around 65 per cent of total agricultural exports from the UK.

Dr Scott Cato argues that Brexit does throw up opportunities for a new approach to farming, but doesn't believe the government are willing to support such an approach.

Dr Cato said: "The decision by Theresa May to opt for a hard Brexit will strike our family farmers and small scale food producers particularly hard.

"They are the cornerstone of agriculture in the South West, so any tariff barriers could seriously weaken the regional economy and devastate rural communities.

"The government has no plan on replace the agricultural support and direct payments farmers receive through the Common Agriculture Policy.

"It wants to end free movement which will mean farms are no longer able to take on seasonal migrant labour from EU countries.While exiting the single market could mean the imposition of steep tariffs on exports and imports.

"This is a triple whammy few family farms in the south West could withstand.

"Brexit could be used as an opportunity to move towards a diverse and ecologically sustainable farming system; one which focuses on re-localising food production and boosting rural economies.

"But so far all we have heard from the Defra secretary, Andrea Leadsom, are plans to shred EU legislation, dismissing it as red tape.

"But many of these measures are aimed at safeguarding our soils, protecting habitats, guaranteeing animal welfare and utilizing farmland for capturing and storing carbon to help in the fight against climate change.

"This government seems hell-bent on pushing large scale industrialised farming post-Brexit, and letting our family farms and small scale producers flounder.

"Such an approach will leave the 71 per cent of our land currently used as farmland less protected and further damaged; less beneficial to protecting soils, biodiversity and animal welfare and less able to tackle climate change."