Pause for thought – “Events dear boy, events..” or something like that
It’s rare that the editor pens a piece of commentary for the weekly news, but this week the mood took me.. I though I would just look back over the last few weeks.
Fresh back from Groundswell (for the uninitiated, a regenerative farming festival in Hertfordshire), and that’s three days, two nights (!), a stand meeting farmers, industry contacts, investors and landowners and some top level ‘socialising’. Oh and I camped, which is recommended.
Earlier in the week, the Tillage-Live site was inspected, now that the rye has been chopped, its ready for cover crops, a rye cereal plot and a maize plot – for the inter row weeding demos. Its shaping up (fingers crossed and weather allowing) to be a decent site come September.
The Cereals Event two weeks ago at the new venue of Thoresby Park in Nottinghamshire had a great feel about it, the organisers had clearly thought about the layout, everything felt close together and although there were traffic issues from one direction, they can be sorted for future years.
Both events had a good turnout, strong focus and decent feedback from the trade, and yet.. Groundswell delivered on all levels, with c 7000 paying attendees each day (@ £120 a pop) it was sold out each day according to the organisers, the seminars were packed, machine demos ran all day, the convivial friendly atmosphere, Andy Cato’s live DJ set with music, ale and dancing each night certainly entranced the visitors and trade alike. There was the sticky issue of ‘what is regen ag’ to contend with though.
Given that Cereals will be on a site almost 4 miles away next year, it will be very interesting to see how both events develop alongside each other and with only a couple of weeks between them.. Yours truly will be donning his Birkenstocks again, and bracing for a few more late nights!
We haven’t even mentioned interest rates, dealer stock levels or many farmers blind ignorance to the loss of BPS yet.. watch this space.
I hope you have had a good weekend.
Kind regards
Andy
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Groundswell sessions, promise to deliver on a diversity of topics around regenerative agriculture