The new initiative has been launched by North Wales Police to help improve communications and crackdown on rural crime.
Meirionnydd based Community Beat Manager, PC Dewi Wynne, who is running the scheme along with PCSO Michelle Williams, said it was part of a Farmwatch initiative which he hoped would soon be operating force wide.
He said: “North Wales Police are determined to do everything they can to help reduce rural crime and work very closely with farmers to address this issue.
“We can now send out warnings or advice to farmers via their mobile phones and they have a number that they can text back to us which reverts to an email and this means that officers can respond quicker.
“The original scheme, which was launched in Bala 18 months ago thanks to funding from the Meirionnydd Community Safety Forum, only allowed us to send out texts to famers on their mobile phones, but they were unable to reply.
“Gwynedd Community Safety Partnerships have funded the recent upgrade to allow farmers to text a reply and the running costs are now being paid by iGroup after we successfully won a grant of £1.500.
“It has the full backing of the Farmers Union for Wales and the National Farmers Union and is also currently operating in South Denbighshire.
“The new initiative has only been running just over two months and already it is paying dividends as we recently had two arrests for theft of scrap metal from a farmyard in Meirionnydd. This came about because we were alerted by one of the farmers.”
Inspector Mark Armstrong, speaking on behalf of the Meirionnydd Community Safety Forum said: “The Farmwatch scheme is an excellent tool in tackling thefts from isolated rural communities. Farmers and other people who are out on the roads and the land are invaluable as they know who is in the area, and if people are aware of specific crimes or suspicious persons having recently been reported, Farmwatch texts can enhance people’s awareness of those who may be of interest to the Police in their area.
“The new reply text facility also enables subscribers to share any information they have immediately with officers. I hope that as the success of this system increases, more residents of the countryside will sign up for this free service, thus strengthening its capabilities.”
PC Wynne said that he and his officers were keen to extend the scheme and regularly held road shows in different areas showing a DVD demonstrating the workings of the scheme.
He said that they had recently shown the DVD in Anglesey and he was hopeful that if funding was available then they would also be signing up for the service.
