This week, we announced Matt Knight's departure from RABDF following his decision to pursue a new challenge. Matt's commitment and leadership will be a huge loss to the association. Speaking for the trustees, we wish Matt every success in the future and in his career.
With immediate effect, I will be stepping in to manage the team at RABDF and assisting with our future activities, including the Gold Cup Open Day and Down to Earth.
RABDF will now take this opportunity to review our future strategy, but please rest assured that the Association will continue to operate as usual.
Following one of our most successful Dairy-Tech events to date, we are excited to bring you our second major event of the year, the NMR/ RABDF Gold Cup, at Bisterne Farms, Dorset, on 22 May.
In a break from tradition, this year's Gold Cup winners will showcase how their low-input, grass-based, cross-bred herd won by highlighting how they are maximising performance across the board.
Industry experts who have contributed to the farm's success, such as The Andersons Centre, LIC and Synergy Farm Health, will speak at the event at a series of talk stations around the farm.
George Brown and his ambitious team will also explain how they have pushed the herd to produce 3,730 litres of milk from forage and how strategic decisions have ultimately resulted in the business becoming a 'premier' herd.
As well as the Gold Cup, it's also great to be back with our third Down to Earth event, which this year is taking place at Grosvenor Farms in Cheshire on 3 July. This event is designed to offer something for everyone interested in profitable farming and transitioning towards more environmentally acceptable systems. Do keep posted at projectdowntoearth.co.uk for all the latest information.
It's been an interesting start to the year for agriculture, with a lot of tension building among farmers and our members about the balance between food production and environmental conservation. Protests seen across Wales and London last month highlight the existing tension.
The government is listening, and only last week (25 March), announced new measures aimed at reaffirming the balance between environmental conservation and food production in farming practices.
As part of the Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI), the measures limit the extent farmers can allocate their land away from productive food growing activities. We hope to provide more on this in our next Policy Update, which you can view at https://www.rabdf.co.uk/policy-updates
I look forward to meeting lots of you at next month's event. In the meantime time, if you do have any feedback on activities you'd like to see the RABDF involved in to help build into our strategic development, then please get in touch by emailing office@rabdf.co.uk.
Best wishes,
Robert