With all the fuss about food miles, local produce and the rural economy you'd think the powers-that-be would be encouraging small initiatives such as those who make just enough cider for themselves and a bit extra to sell on to cover the costs of equipment etc and maintaining a traditional orchard.
So at present, anybody who makes 7,000 litres or less per year is exempt from excise duty. That's calculated to be well below anything you could make a living out of by itself, and was originally drawn up to allow mixed farmers to continue this age old practice without falling foul of the law.
Alas, the EU would appear to vew this as an undesignated anomoly and the The EU Commission are setting up a working group to address special excise duty conditions relating to small scale industries. This is likely to result in the removal of the exemption
"ukcider", an internet based community of cidermakers and supporters has mounted a campaign to defend the small cidermakers exemption. Please help and support us by reading, understanding and discussing the issue. There is some background information on the ukcider wiki at
and a petition to HM Government which you can sign at
The petition has done well amongst all the others there, gaining 250 signatures in the first week, so we hope you will spread the word and multiply this into a figure they will have to take notice of.