Sharing Information

Community ownership and land matching

February 15, 2024February 15, 2024 by Andi Chapple

Access to land for aspiring or experienced farmers can be a challenge. Land prices now outstrip the potential returns from small-scale farming so that fields which could be used for food production are often sold for housing, as an investment, for carbon off-setting or other more lucrative uses. This contributes to a widening gap between urban and rural areas, which is leaving whole communities disconnected from the land and dependent on an industrialised food system which is contributing to ill-health and climate breakdown.

But there is another way: throughout the UK many communities are finding creative ways to come together to protect our green, rural spaces for food growing and landscape recovery. Featuring case studies from successful projects, this one-day farm visit will:

Explore case studies of getting land into community ownership, including Moss Lane farm’s work and strategy
Include a tour of Moss Lane farm and the community businesses that share the land
Be a chance to identify further actions to support greater land access for agroecological farming in the North of England

Follow the link below to join us and explore different ways to access land for food, farming and nature, including community ownership and land matching:

https://www.tickettailor.com/events/northernrealfarmingconference/1138481

10.30am – 4pm (lunch provided)

Moss Lane Farm, M30 7RL, near Eccles (Salford), Thursday 21 March 2024.

Outline programme:

10.30 am Arrival/tea/coffee

10.45am Introductions and welcome

11.30am Context: the qualifications landscape and progress/challenges towards embedding agroecology in existing models

11.30pm Tour of Haigh Hall

1.00pm Lunch

1.45pm Co-designing a L2

3.15pm Collation of feedback on current system

3.30pm Wrap up and next steps/what more is needed in the North?

4pm Close

Exploring a level 2 curriculum for agroecology

February 15, 2024February 10, 2024 by Andi Chapple

The qualification options for equipping people for land-based careers in an agroecological context are limited. As we understand more about the challenges in the current globalised, industrialised food and farming systems, the need to train our young people for a different food producing future becomes critical.

At Haigh Hall, the plans are to do just that. Combining agroecology, heritage kitchen gardening and food system politics a new two-year, accredited level 2 apprenticeship in productive horticulture is under development. There are currently no horticultural apprenticeships in Wigan, so together with the local college (Wigan and Leigh) we have the opportunity to create something beneficial for the borough and the wider region.

The walled gardens are due for restoration and we have the opportunity to design and build a syllabus as well as a garden ideally suited for training a new generation of growers.

Follow the link below to join us and co-design a curriculum that will better fit the future, and provide feedback for the barriers for change with the existing qualifications frameworks:

https://www.tickettailor.com/events/northernrealfarmingconference/1138499

10.30am – 4pm (lunch and refreshments provided)

Haigh Hall, WN2 1PE, near Wigan, Monday 11 March 2024.

Outline programme:

10.30 am Arrival/tea/coffee

10.45am Introductions and welcome

11.30am Context: the qualifications landscape and progress/challenges towards embedding agroecology in existing models

11.30pm Tour of Haigh Hall

1.00pm Lunch

1.45pm Co-designing a L2

3.15pm Collation of feedback on current system

3.30pm Wrap up and next steps/what more is needed in the North?

4pm Close

Mushrooms, self-sufficiency and peat

Hosted by the Soil Association

The UK is less than 50% self-sufficient in mushrooms which is strange for a crop mostly grown in non-season dependant conditions. Opportunities for increasing UK mushroom production appears to be a low hanging fruit. We explore the aspirations and pitfalls of running an organic mushroom business selling both edible and medicinal produce and discuss scope for mycoremediation – cleaning up the environment using unproductive mushroom substrate. Upscaling mushroom production has its benefits and challenges but could small scale horticultural enterprises diversifying into mushroom production be a solution? We examine how new entrants could access mushroom growing through relatively cheap converted portable spaces and trial-before-you-buy schemes. Peat has been a contentious input in mushroom production (particularly for the infamous button mushroom). As part of Organic-PLUS research the Soil Association has been looking at some of the challenges facing the industry.

Speakers/hosts include:

Hugh Blogg – Hugh is Soil Association Horticultural Advisor, Farming and Land Use Team and has experience running a small-scale enterprise – Fungusloci – an urban mushroom micro-farm growing gourmet mushrooms on spent coffee. He leads on potato supply chain work focusing on the uptake of blight resistant varieties within retail. Further areas of focus include issues around seed for small scale growers, technical organic gardening queries, supporting the Fruit and Vegetable Alliance, and coordinating grower support for organic vineyards. Hugh has been involved in work on innovative solutions in organic agriculture and better connecting organic farming, carbon sequestration and soil health.

Tom Baxter – Tom is founder of Bristol Fungarium – producer of the UK’s only organic certified medicinal mushroom tinctures, grown and produced in Somerset

James Scriven – James is founder of Mycogeneration – an applied mycology business helping small-scale producers diversify into mushroom production

Farm walk: Growing Well and Low Sizergh Farm

Hosted by Growing Well and Low Sizergh Farm

Growing Well Kendal and Low Sizergh Farm are both based from the Sizergh Estate in Kendal.

Growing Well Kendal is a mental health charity, training centre and the biggest producer of organic vegetables in Cumbria. Between Monday and Thursday every week Growing Well open their doors to members of the community who have been referred via their GP due to their mental health to learn how to grow, sew, hoe and much more to provide veg boxes for the local community ‘crop share’ with a friendly team of volunteers at hand. The lead growers at the site will be able to walk you around the 8-year crop rotation on site and talk you through why organic practices are so important to them and the amazing progress they have made in the past few years.

Low Sizergh Farm is a working farm still run by three generations of the family. Alison can be found running the farm shop, gift gallery and café, whilst her brother Richard (who will be leading the tour) runs the farm with his son Matthew. John jokes that he’s now the farm boy sent to run all the errands and Marjorie spends as much time as possible painting in her shed. More than 50 local people are employed with Paul Seward working on the farm for nearly 30 years. They do everything with the future in mind, looking after the soil, the landscape and wildlife whilst being part of a vibrant rural economy. Their main crop is the grass that the cows eat all year round which helps them produce milk that they sell in the shop vending machine, the organic milk suppliers cooperative OMSCO and a local cheese and ice cream maker.

A point of interest would be how the farm started out as organic, changed to non-organic practices then back to organic for an array of reasons you’ll be able to discover on the tour.

You will need to book places on this walk separately. More information will be sent to all ticket-holders. There is additional information about Low Sizergh Farm below.

Low Sizergh Farm is a working farm still run by three generations of the Park family. They do everything with the future in mind, looking after the soil, the landscape and wildlife whilst being part of a vibrant rural economy.

Milk is sold through a vending machine outside the farm shop, the organic milk suppliers cooperative OMSCO and to a local cheese and ice cream maker.

Cows Youngstock: 168 Holstein x Swedish Red x Montbeliarde 109 Young
stock, cross breeding for 20 years with a strong emphasis on healthy cows and milk from forage.

Autumn block calved over 12 weeks

Grassland management:

All grazing is rotational, dairy cow platform split into 33 paddocks 1.45 HA 12-hour breaks, YS moved daily fields splitusing electric fences, front and back, with mobile water troughs. Sheep moved weekly.

Dry cows are mob grazed over parkland and permanent pasture.

Re seeding cow grazing with simple herbal ley ryegrass white & red clover chicory & plantain. Silage ryegrass red clover chicory and plantain. still experimenting to find the best mix, 4 cuts of silage and round bales from surplus grass on grazing area.

Arable: Spring barley and peas for whole crop on a 4-year rotation over the silage area

Conservation work:

Traditional hedge management
Re-planting of orchards with local varieties of apple, damson, plum
Creation of pond
Fencing off less useful grassland for wildlife habitat farm trail
HLS scheme ends Jan 22 considering the options

A point of interest would be how the farm started out as organic, changed to non-organic practices then back to organic after trainings in Holistic management and farm scale permaculture see how these practices have been incorporated in the farms management on the tour.

No-till with living mulches – the holy grail for arable?

Hosted by the Soil Association

No-till arable farming has revolutionised the arable farming mindset and is of interest to organic farmers because of its potential to reduce cultivations whilst providing weed control, fertility and soil health. It is also of interest to regenerative farmers who want to reduce inputs of artificial fertilisers and chemicals. But is it possible? Cover crops or green manures have always been part of organic arable systems but are now commonly used conventionally as part of regenerative farming systems.. The 4 pillars of regenerative farming are no-till, continuous ground cover, crop diversity and livestock integration.

In organic systems, cover crops have generally been ploughed in to provide fertility for the rotation but adopting organic no-till will require termination of the cover crop and this is difficult for organic farmers who cannot use chemicals.

One solution? A non-aggressive, low growing permanent cover crop such as small white clover, which shades out weeds and provides fertility.

In this session, we talk to an arable farming expert as well as the researcher who are looking at the potential of no-till with living mulches with a group of organic and conventional farmers running on-farm trials, plus a Scottish farmer trying out the technique.

Speakers/hosts include:

Jerry Alford- Soil Association arable and soils advisor.
Jerry is interested in a systems approach to farming, and looks at farms as a whole system rather than just a mix of enterprises or a series of crops in rotation. He is also looking at options to reduce cultivations within organic rotations and the adoption of more agroecological and organic type systems in non-organic farms.

Harry Henderson – Starting out as a tractor, combine and crop sprayer operator. Harry then worked for Rothamsted Research Station UK, before coming farm manager at Monsanto Cambridge. From there he took a role with John Deere UK ltd as a Crop Systems Specialist involved in technical dealer sales support in combine harvester, crop sprayer and precision technology products. In 2013 Harry joined AHDB as a regional manager for the North of England and is now a Knowledge Exchange Manager with a focus technical knowledge exchange, mechanisation, soil management and arable farming.

Stuart Mitchell – Stuart is an organic beef, deer and arable farmer from Denholm Scotland. He is trialling no-till in the Scottish Borders

Dominic Amos – Dominic works at the Organic Research Centre, having joined five years ago to pursue research interests in sustainable cropping and soils management. Having previously worked testing agrochemicals, providing data for agrochemical companies he now works with farmers across projects including the Innovative Farmers programme, supporting farmers to conduct on-farm research supporting them to test innovation. He works as researcher on the living mulch field lab exploring with the farmers the use of a clover understory as an approach for improving cropping system sustainability and improving soil health.

Citizen Grain: Engaging communities in a better flour and bread system

Hosted by Scotland the Bread

Scotland The Bread is a collaborative project to grow better grain and bake better bread with the common purposes of nourishment, sustainability and food sovereignty. As well as researching more nutrient dense varieties of grain, growing them organically and milling on farm into fine wholemeal flour, we lead a number of projects aiming to engage Scottish communities in a flour and bread system that is healthy, equitable, locally controlled and sustainable.

In this session we will share the practical approaches we are taking to ensure access to better flour, better bread and an understanding of the grain system for all. We will hear the voices of communities involved in our Soil to Slice and Flour to the People projects and a description of our inclusive ‘People’s Plant Breeding’ approach to seed selection. There will also be the opportunity to learn about research being undertaken into a progressive ‘people nourished per hectare’ standard which – although currently focusing on our grain production – could transform how we value all food we produce.

Scotland The Bread wants to work collaboratively with others involved in creating a better grain system. While demonstrating our approach to this task, we hope that this session will provide the opportunity to connect with others in North England and Scotland interested in joining us to inspire change.

Speakers/hosts include:

Tara Wight – PhD student in crop science, University of Edinburgh

In 2020 Tara carried out a professional internship placement with Nourish Scotland and Scotland The Bread exploring the potential for collaborative and participatory seed selection to improve crop development and community engagement in local grain systems.

Daisy Martinez – Food Systems Research Assistant, University of Edinburgh

Daisy is part of a team – also including Dr Lindsay Jaacks and Dr Alfy Gathorne-Hardy – from the University of Edinburgh working on a research collaboration with Scotland the Bread that aims to understand how Scottish grain growing, flour milling, and bread baking can provide good quality jobs for the people of Scotland and looking to develop a ‘people, jobs and species nourished per hectare’ model that has the potential to improve how we measure food environments.

Sam Parsons – Estate Manager, Balcaskie Estate

Sam manages the thirteen farms that form Balcaskie Estate in the East Neuk of Fife. In 2015, the estate decided to switch from a conventional to a more regenerative, organic farming system, with the aims of measuring quality over quantity and moving away from producing for commodity markets. Since 2018, the estate has been growing Scotland The Bread’s diverse grains, and now lends its name to the Balcaskie Landrace wheat milled on-farm and sold to professional and home bakers.

Philip Revell – Projects Coordinator, Sustaining Dunbar

A founder member of Sustaining Dunbar with vast experience in environmental and community projects, since 2019 Philip has been leading a team of ‘patchwork farmers’ growing grains in small garden plots across the district as part of Scotland The Bread’s Soil to Slice project. Through this project, the community hope to develop a locally adapted landrace which can be used to re-establish a local supply chain linking growers, millers and bakers in the area.

Lyndsay Cochrane – Project Coordinator, Scotland The Bread

(Facilitator) Lyndsay Cochrane coordinates Scotland The Bread’s community outreach projects, working to engage local people in the movement to create a better flour and bread system.