The Summer 2018 No.43 ORGANICThe journal of the Organic GROWER Growers Alliance IN THIS ISSUE THE END OF AN ERA Roger’s rambles ........................................2 News .........................................................3 Innovative Farmers Network Day ...........5 11th OGA AGM ......................................6 New OGA committee ..............................7 Interview with Alan Schofield .................8 Traineeships ...........................................10 Knife culture...........................................11 Walk-behind tractors ..............................11 Practical soil assessment methods .........12 GREATsoils field labs ............................15 Riverford field labs .................................16 Organic Farming MSc ..........................17 No-till for growers. Part 2 .....................18 GPDR: What you need to know ............22 Nature notes—the opposite wood ..........23 Jason Horner: crop hindsights ...............24 St Swithins and all that .........................26 Desert Island growers: Adam Payne and Dee Butterly ....................................27 Biopesticides: a changing landscape ......28 Biological control of red spider mite ......31 Book reviews: Steiner or Howard ..........32 The great agricultural resettlement .......34 Events .....................................................36 Page 1 - The Organic Grower - No 43 Summer 2018 depth and breadth of experience and technical knowledge and this should be the basis of our future development. There were Roger’s rambles some excellent contributions from LWA members in the room and we are following up on these by meeting with the LWA to discuss “Weather? Don’t talk to me about weather” a number of issues including guidance on structure and funding. as Marvin the Robot might have said. We It has been a very busy time since the last Organic Grower. The seem to have had the lot over the last 3 major Defra consultation ‘Health and Harmony’ had a May 8th months and it has been a much delayed deadline and it was seen as vital that as many responses as possible spring this year. Unless you are lucky and from the organic and agroecological sectors should be submitted. have soils that are always well-drained, The English Organic Forum, of which OGA is a member, submitted I suspect the biggest problem (apart a detailed 35 page document; Kate Collyns submitted an OGA from the temperatures) has been waiting for the outside soil to response and there were a number of individual responses. We had dry out to the point that cultivation, sowing and planting can get hoped to canvas the membership for ideas and suggestions as well underway. I remember our silty clay loam in Carmarthen took as encouraging individual and personal responses. Unfortunately seven dry days before we could get on it and typically it would be the appearance of CoinMiner malware on the website meant that dry for four or five days then the rain would come and push the communication was effectively suspended during the crucial run whole process back. up to the deadline. This has now thankfully been cleared and we The recent dry spell, for most of the country, brings the second have also set up an alternative mailing route via MailChimp. problem. We would have a window of about seven days where There have been a number of important meetings related to the soil was relatively easy to work then it became too dry for easy the Defra consultation that have been attended by members of cultivation. Any clods would turn to bricks and over-cultivated the committee including Kate, Ellen, Tony and Adam. This is a soils would become dusty – yes I was guilty of the ultimate sin: welcome development in that the load is being spread and this is thinking one more pass with the rotovator would not cause any something we intend to continue. Kate also spotted a consultation problems. Nobody said it would be easy and that’s what sets on the National Planning Policy Framework that was ending growers apart from most other folk – a capacity to take things on suspiciously close to the Health and Harmony deadline and she the chin and crack on whatever the weather. was able to submit an OGA response. Weather was a feature of the AGM, held this year at Abbey Home The new Organic Regulation has now formally passed into law Farm. Snow swirled around as a Gloucester apple tree was planted and there is a workshop planned in London on 15th June that will in memory of Keith Denning, head grower from 1998 to 2014. The look at Future Regulatory Options post-Brexit. There will also OGA provided an oak plaque with the words “The garden grows be farmer/grower workshops in Shrewsbury at Pimhill Farm on quietly, never a sound – the fruits of your labour are all around.” 20th June and Cirencester, at Abbey Home Farm on 29th June. We It was a memorable and poignant moment shared with Keith’s hope to get an OGA representative to the London meeting and it family who appreciated the ceremony. would be good if those of you who are reasonably close could get After lunch it was down to business and there were some critical to the farmer/grower workshops. issues to discuss, of which one of the most important was finding Finally, it will not have escaped your notice that there is something replacements for long-serving members who had stood down. called the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) that will We are delighted to welcome Adam Keeves, Antonia Ineson have come into force by the time you read this. The OGA is not Ellen Rignell and Jim Aplin to the committee and they have all exempt from the requirements of GDPR as you will have seen definitely hit the ground running. from our Mailchimp messages and we believe we have done all This did not immediately resolve the question of who would take that is necessary to comply. A relatively simple privacy policy on the Treasurer’s role, managed superbly by Debra Schofield will be made available. This seemingly straightforward exercise since the OGA was set up. If we could not put up a nominated has taken a lot of behind the scenes work to sort out our databases replacement the bank account would effectively have been put on and extract the information to Mailchimp. This is helping to hold so there was relief all round when Ben Raskin took on the simplify the website and reduce the number of spurious accounts role in the interim. It has now passed to Adam Keeves who is and long term lapsed memberships. busy completing the bank account transfer and getting his head Enough rambling – it’s time to get back out and try and catch up round the past records. with my garden cropping. I hope the clement weather continues The other key issues included a discussion around the vision for and that we all have a good season. the OGA and a renewal of the commitment to change the structure Roger Hitchings, Acting Chairman Organic Growers to an incorporated version. There was a definite appetite for the OGA to continue as a separate organisation and not seek to merge Alliance with the Landworkers’ Alliance (LWA). Our greatest asset is the Cover: Alan Schofield with some valedictory words, as he steps down from the OGA Chair at the AGM (Photo: Phil Sumption) Page 2 - The Organic Grower - No 43 Summer 2018 Brexit news Consultation responses: Defra for a scheme to dramatically increase local fruit and vegetable production following Brexit. Future Farming & Planning Policy To meet the UK demand for fruit and Agricultural Revolution A New Deal for Many of you will be aware of the Defra consultation which Horticulture: vegetables, a massive scaling up of Ideas for a horticulture took place between February and May of what farming policy renewal programme and production is required. If everyone illustrative case studies should look like post-Brexit, and many will also have made it to in Britain were to eat the ‘Seven a the various countrywide events, and also submitted their own day’ now recommended by Public thoughts and responses to the Health & Harmony paper either Health England, we would need an via the portal on the website, or via email. We also submitted an additional 2.4 million tonnes of fresh official response on behalf of the OGA: if you’d like to see a copy produce, equivalent to a 66% growth of what we sent in, please email [email protected]. We are in UK production. The Eatwell Guide also members of the English Organic Forum (EOF) which sent The Landworkers Alliance and Growing Communities recommends that 40% of each person’s New Entrants into Agriculture | 1 in joint response highlighting the benefits of organic growing: if Published by diet consists of fruit and vegetables, you’d like to see that response, please let us know. yet currently only 1% of the £3 billion agriculture budget is For our own response, we focused on including smaller scale spent on horticulture. Over the last 30 years the area planted to farmers and growers in statistic gathering and support eligibility; vegetables in the UK has decreased by 26%. highlighted the fact that organic farming has many answers to the Defra’s recently released consultation paper on post-Brexit paper’s stated aims on soil health, biodiversity and other ‘public Agriculture is entitled, ‘Health and Harmony: The future for food, goods’; and stated how new entrants need access to land and farming and the environment in a green Brexit’. Spokesperson housing, mentoring and ongoing support, funding and markets. for the LWA Horticulture Campaign, Rebecca Laughton says, We also emphasised the importance of collaborating with the “If Defra is serious about bringing health into the Post-Brexit planning department to allow a more farmer/grower-friendly agricultural policy, it is essential that they adopt a proactive system of allowing workers to live on the land, beefing up the approach to horticultural regeneration, which addresses the agricultural tie regulation so that planners can feel confident when challenges currently faced by UK horticulture and substantially issuing permission with an agricultural tie that the tie won’t be increases the proportion of the agriculture budget focused on fruit easily broken shortly afterwards, and that the whole thing was and vegetable production”.