Eight arable growers have joined HGCA’s Monitor Farm programme in the first large-scale, farmer-led initiative of its kind in England and Wales.

Following the successful call in November 2013, the eight new Monitor Farms were selected from 136 interested farmers. The eight farms are the first in a network of 24 HGCA Monitor Farms to be rolled out over three years, with a focus on business improvement, benchmarking and cost of production.

The Monitor Farm model is based on the sharing of best practice and the challenge of decision making through group discussion. This network of HGCA Monitor Farms representing different business models and farming systems will face the same challenges and need to find rapid solutions to the same daily issues confronting their peers and the wider industry.

Each farmer will be in the scheme for three years, hosting meetings of local growers to share best practice and knowledge. The monitor farmers, their steering group and associated HGCA Arable Business Groups will deliver benchmarking activity and peer review of decision-making on farm. While highlighting cost of production and efficiency, this will also bring a new focus on day-to-day farm decision making.

HGCA’s Regional Managers, supported by a network of Regional Officers, will facilitate activities at each site to deliver technical input and a detailed analysis of production costs. They will also work with farmers on knowledge exchange and dissemination to the wider industry, to promote best practice.

Richard Laverick, HGCA’s Head of Regional Development, said: “The potential for impact in the industry is huge, because this is the first farmer led, farmer centred and farmer driven business improvement initiative to be delivered on this scale in England and Wales.

“The farmers decide the agenda and programme of activity for each site, with a clear aim to achieve a demonstrable improvement in business performance over the three years of the programme.

“The underlying premise is that farmers learn best from fellow farmers. Hard evidence of business improvement and the demonstration of new techniques on a commercial scale are the keys to bringing about behaviour change and spreading best practice.”

He added: “A willingness to share information with peers is vital for growers wanting to engage with the HGCA Monitor Farms. Through the project HGCA aims to highlight opportunities for greater cooperation between neighbouring growers, helping to spread risk, develop understanding and ultimately to build sector resilience.”

The new HGCA monitor farmers are:

• · Phil Meadley, Driffield, Yorkshire
• · Mike Daniells, Louth, Lincolnshire
• · Jo Franklin, Royston, Hertfordshire
• · Tom Bradshaw, Colchester, Essex
• · Julian Gold, Wantage, Oxfordshire
• · James Lee, Crediton, Devon
• · Rob Fox, Leamington Spa, Warwickshire
• · Mark Wood, Fawley, Herefordshire

In the north of the country, Phil Meadley farms 250ha near Driffield, approximately four miles from the North Sea coast. In a four-way family partnership, he grows milling wheat, oilseed rape, peas and barley. Phil is particularly interested in soil health, reducing fuel usage, addressing mycotoxins and looking at his whole approach to cultivations.

Also in the north, Mike Daniells is a farm manager at Swaby near Louth. On land totalling 2,000ha Mike grows first wheat, winter and spring barley, oilseed rape, spring beans and vining peas, as well as keeping a herd of 60 suckler cows. Like many growers around the country Mike is finding black-grass control more difficult, and wants to address this, in addition to making a steady move towards a no-till system. He is already in an ELS scheme, with Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) on his land and has started using GPS to achieve variable fertiliser rates.

Jo Franklin is a partner in her family farm and grows approximately 930ha of combinable crops just to the west of Royston, Hertfordshire. The chalk-based land is part owned and part rented with the rest on a mixture of share and contract farming arrangements, and includes an area of grassland used to support a flock of sheep. Jo has a keen interest in soil and crop health, and uses a number of precision farming techniques to ensure accuracy of application. She provides agronomy advice for some of her neighbours and carries out in-house trials. She is currently developing a commercial grain storage facility on-farm. Financial viability and pushing yields are her other main interests.

The second monitor farmer for the east of the country is Tom Bradshaw. Tom is a partner in his family farm and grows 1,485ha of combinable crops – malting barley, milling wheat, peas and beans - to the west of Colchester in Essex. Apart from a small area of owned land, the majority is farmed under contracting arrangements and includes a wide range of soil types. He has been involved in Recommended Lists trials, and appeared on the BBC Harvest programme in 2013. Tom was recently elected to the NFU combinable crops board.

The HGCA Monitor Farm with the longest recorded history is at East Hendred near Wantage, managed by Julian Gold. The farm has been in the Eyston family since 1300, a family which can trace itself back to Sir Thomas More. Julian farms 800ha on a five-year rotation of oilseed rape, winter wheat, spring beans, winter wheat and second wheat, winter or spring barley. The farm is primarily arable, although there are also sheep and shoot enterprises. Julian is passionate about sustainable intensification, reducing wastage, soil health and controlled traffic farming.

Further south, James Lee is HGCA’s new monitor farmer near Crediton. A family partnership, the Lees farm a total of 260ha, of which 140ha is arable. They also have 70 suckler cows and 350 ewes. Farming hilly terrain with thin to medium loams, James has experienced benchmarking and peer review in New Zealand and wants to emulate this in the UK. James and his family currently grow oilseed rape, winter wheat, spring barley and oats, and want to expand their diversification.

Robert Fox is a farm manager based just outside Leamington Spa. The business is highly diversified, with a large enterprise around general storage and document storage, as well as machinery and labour sharing with another arable farm. Robert farms 400ha of owned and rented land, with a rotation of winter wheat, winter barley, winter oilseed rape, spring beans and spring barley. His challenges in the coming years include black-grass control, improving soil quality and introducing controlled traffic farming.

Mark Wood is a farm manager based half way between Hereford and Ross-on-Wye. The farm is 250ha owned, 250ha rented and 500ha contract-farmed, primarily growing feed wheat as well as peas, oats and oilseed rape. Mark has three full time staff, and is a member of the Rosemaund Farmers Association. The issues facing Mark and the farm include precision farming, staff replacement and achieving consistent yields under variable conditions. Mark has hosted trial work for other organisations in the past.

The Monitor Farm concept is a proven model that originated in New Zealand and has been developed in Scotland over the past ten years. Independent reviews have confirmed the industry impact and benefit of the programme in Scotland, with sharing of experience highlighted as the most beneficial aspects of the concept.

Each of the new Monitor Farms will hold an opening meeting in June or July 2014.