Around the parade ring of C&D Auction Marts approximately 30 people watch as cattle filter through the gates, one after the other, to be sold to the highest bidder. The livestock auctioneers and valuers, located on the edge of Dumfries town centre, host their weekly Primestock sale every Wednesday.

A few of the men around the octagonal ring have their heads through the railings, presumably for a better view of the cattle, and make a series of subtle nods and winks towards the auctioneer who rattles through the bidding. The majority of men - and it is nearly all men, in the usual farming uniform of wellies, tweed, flat caps and quilted jackets in varying shades of green - sit in the stands, chatting to their colleagues, as the auction proceeds before them.

One of the subjects of discussion is the forthcoming European Union referendum. The farming industry receives significant support from the EU with around 39% of the total EU budget, equivalent to €58bn, devoted to the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP).

Founded in 1962, the CAP was specifically designed to increase agricultural productivity across the European Union. This increase in productivity ensured that consumers had a stable supply of food - at a fair price - whilst also ensuring that farmers received adequate support to earn a reasonable living. Support also helps them in introducing environmentally sustainable practices and provides them with the resources to comply with EU legislation whose standards are amongst the highest in the world.

The National Farmers Union of Scotland (NFUS) has committed to remaining in the EU by stating that “the overall benefits of staying in the European Union currently outweigh any advantages businesses would gain from leaving the EU.”

The NFUS’s desire to stay within the EU is understandable when you consider the importance of the CAP in supporting the agricultural industry in Scotland. From 2014-2020, Scotland will receive up to €3,976.8m as a result of the policy.

In spite of this support, Alistair McFadzean, a sheep farmer from Dumfries who was present at the auction, is committed to leaving the EU.

“I think we’re too beholden to Brussels. I think if we take the New Zealand system (a system of no subsidies), take the bull by the horns, there’ll be some casualties but in the long run we produce the best stock in the world, the best farmers in the world and that’s what the future is.”

The 69-year-old would be happy for subsidies to completely disappear and does not believe that leaving the EU, the biggest single consumer market in the world, will prevent Scottish farmers from exporting goods.

“If you have something good it will sell. It doesn’t matter where you are or the size of your market… they still want good quality beef and lamb and mutton in Europe and they’d still come to Scotland for it.”

Despite his optimism, he acknowledges that there will be difficulties ahead if Britain opts to leave the EU.

“There’s going to be hiccups, no question. Nothing can change without a number of casualties but in the overall picture,” he added. “I think we produce products that the rest of the world want, of a standard that is at the top.”

Another who is edging towards Brexit is David Sloan, 57, a mixed farmer whose main focus is dairy. He too believes that the removal of subsidies would be in the long term interests of British farmers as consumers would have to start paying a price for produce which reflects the costs of production.

“At the end of the day, our subsidies, I think, are really a subsidy in the supermarket trolley,” he said.

Another of Sloan’s main reasons for opting to leave is the potential removal of regulations imposed by the EU. He cites the example of sheep farmers being forced by EU legislation to remove the vertebrae of a lamb if its teeth are visible once it has been slaughtered in order to prevent the ovine equivalent of BSE.

“There’s no science behind that rule still being in place and, somehow or other, the farmer’s union can't get it removed. And if we’re out of Europe, things like that, we’ll just get rid of it.

“I think we’re a country that can stand on our own two feet and I think we should make our own rules and get on with it,” he said firmly.

This desire to exit the EU is perhaps surprising from farmers based in Dumfries & Galloway as the local economy is particularly reliant on the industry. The agricultural industry in Scotland employs 67,000 people, equivalent to 2.6% of the total workforce. In Dumfries and Galloway, however, this is even more pronounced with 10% of the workforce employed in agriculture.

Based on recent voting history, however, it should come as no surprise. In the 2014 Scottish European Election 15.91% of the electorate in Dumfries and Galloway voted for parties who explicitly wish to leave the EU, including Ukip and the BNP. A further 33.12% of the electorate voted for the Conservative party and in the recent Scottish Government elections two Conservative MSPs were elected by the two constituencies covering the Dumfries and Galloway region.

According to the latest Survation poll, the proportion of Conservative voters who back Brexit is consistently higher than those of the other major parties at 30%. This figure was even higher at 41% in a poll conducted for the Daily Mail in February.

Therefore, despite the importance of the agricultural industry to the local economy, there is clearly an appetite within the region to leave the EU.

This view, however, is not shared by all within the industry. Another of the farmers at the auction, Alastair Martin, a suckling cows and beef cattle farmer, was undecided how he would vote. A lack of information, particularly the repercussions of Brexit in relation to financial support for farmers from the EU, frustrates many within the industry.

Life without "continued support", he says, would be"very much an unknown".

"People can belly ache as long as they like," he says, but if the Leave campaign were able to make the simple promise that farm subsidies would be kept the same in the event of an Out vote then "that certainly within the farming industry would go along the road”.

However, that has not happened, so Martin, based roughly six miles from Dumfries, is cautioning against leaving the EU based on a desire to reduce regulations faced by farmers.

“We have a lot of red tape, regulation, which I think to export into the EU we’d still need to do - because if we didn’t do it they would just close the door on us.”

Andrew McCornick, a Vice President of NFUS, understands the frustrations experienced by farmers with regards to red tape, however, he echoes Martin’s comments when asked if leaving the EU would reduce the regulations faced by British farmers.

“I don’t think it would make a big difference because we would be trading with Europe and we’d have to meet European standards so at the end of the day I don’t think it’s either one way or the other. We’re going to have to produce food for the European market which would be our biggest buyer, which currently is our biggest buyer. We’d have to produce it to the same standards.”

Whilst accepting that “the bureaucracy keeps piling on and piling on and piling on,” the Vice President of the union does not accept that leaving the EU will enhance farmer’s prospects.

“We trade with Europe which is about 500 million people and that’s a big, big market for us and to lose access to," he says, adding that post-Brexit the UK would have to "start renegotiating and we don’t know what terms we’ll be negotiating under because we'll be dealing with Europe as an outsider. We will not be at the table, we will be on the table.”

McCornick, a livestock farmer near Lochfoot, outside Dumfries, also cautions against the idea that Britain will be able to trade more freely with the rest of the world upon exiting the EU.

“We have 50 external trade agreements negotiated by Europe. We would have to sit down at the table and start renegotiating every one of those as well as negotiating with Europe. And when you’re doing a trade agreement there is give and take and I don’t know what would give and what would take whereas we’ve built up a fair bit of strength using European trade business agreements that have been settled.”

When asked in his experience as a member of the union if he had an idea how the agricultural community would vote he said: “I have no idea of a figure but just going through various meetings that I’ve sat at there’s maybe one or two in a room of 30 or 40 people would like to be coming out of Europe. The majority are seeing why we’re sitting in.”