Author: britishseabuckthorn

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What’s happening down on the farm – April showers and a sick laptop.

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As I walk the rows of my sea buckthorn plants this April there is a level of excitment and anticipation as to what they will produce this year. After a dry month the weather has broken and we have had a refreshing weekend of rain. Klaudia always has been the most advanced of varieties, along with Elizaveta; Chuiskaya; and sudarushka. Inya, a variety that stands tall and straight when compared with the others is starting to develop a head of leaf. Altaiskaya is the furthest from the others, showing a tight brush of leaf on each stem head.

Following kirsten Jensen’s visit in February the advise was not to give the plants their spring fee of Chicken manure pellets. Frankia should provide the nitrogen that the plant needs and by providing the pellets it might even reduce the potential of Frankia to perform. The concept is good because these organic chicken pellets are expensive, but there may be practical drawbacks if frankia has not developed in some individual plants.

Not unsurprisingly it is Elizaveta that is an area for concern. This variety has been the one that has been most vigourous in growth. It was also the one that was most open to disease back in 2013. So looking at the plants now in spring 2015 the leaves are fully developed but slightly yellow by comparison with others. This is across most of the elizaveta mature plants, So next week I will provide some of the replicate groups with pellets and some without.

The current focus is to give all plants a dose of compost tea. This takes time. The tea brewer that i have contains 100 lts, in which I place 2lt of compost. On immature plants 100 litres will cover between 800 and 1000 plants. On the more mature ( planted in 2011) plants this reduces down to 600. Iam still using a back pack sprayer, filling it with 10lts of tea per spraying. I had a problem to start with with the larger particles of compost blocking the sprayer.I have now solved that problem by decanting the tea into buckets and letting it settle for 30 mins before pouring it into the sprayer. A full 100 lt tank of tea is sprayed over the plants in a day.The other job on my list is to prune all dead wood out of the plants. For most, this is a cosmetic excercise. There are a few which although 90% of the plant has died back, there is fresh growth coming from both the lower branches – but also in the upper parts of branches that look completely dessicated. These dessicated plants are occasional, but without exception are individuals surrounded by health plants with no apparent reason for dieback.

Last week I walked the rows and destroyed ( by hand ) 8 nests of vapourer moths. This week as i have been spraying compost tea i have yet again found that I had missed another 5 small webs full of caterpillars that are on the verge of starting to break out onto the branches. Experience from last years showed that these voracious feeders can strip a plant in a week. Reports are that within the National Nature reserve adjacent to the farm these insects have become a major infestation. As small back furry caterpillars they are not palletible for birds.

This week was also highlighted by a trip to Germany to investigate harvesting processing and analysis. Options for freezing the branches are under investigation as the prefered option. I am looking to develop a system that is affordable and simple without a heavy need for capital investment. Branch cutting will mean only taking half the crop this year but it will provide an opportunity to prune out plants into a form that makes future harvesting easier.

I have a design for a berry seperator which will need to be built during the next two months. A simple tool but essential one that utilises components that are similar to parts on harvesters for other berry crops.

Over the past three weeks my laptop has been plagued by a virus. I had not appreciated how aggressive these could be. It regenerated three times before now finally seeming to be destroyed. It makes one wonder what the people that create these viruses find as any justification to inflict them on others. Three weeks without a computer allows for more fieldwork and less office work so there are always some silver linings to gray clouds.

Finally, Nepal is a country that is renoun for its sea buckthorn. The news of the earthquake there carries a resonance as of the fragility of our lives within the natural environment. Living in a country the other side of the world from this crisis it is frustrating not being able to help, and the thoughts of how people recover from such an event are painful. At a time when some politicians talk of reduced aid going to foreign countries, this type of event goes to show how vulnerable we are and how important it is that all countries must work together to reduce the impact of these issues when they happen.

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Spring and plans ahead for 2015

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The fact that the country has election fever does not change the fact that the sea buckthorn plants on the farm are almost in open leaf. It has been a full three months for Klaudia to develop from its buds breaking through to being in full leaf.

Simon Parfey came to the farm last week to take soil samples and discuss the coming season of management. The soil samples are still establishing a base line of understanding the ecology of my clay soil. The soil quality varies across the site and this was evident when we first planted the sea  buckthorn. There were areas that were poisoned with wild oats. There still are areas where drainage is poor, but with two applications of green waste mulch each year the soil health will change.

Simon left a bag of compost for brewing tea. This year the plants will get a foliar feed of tea every three weeks. This is not easy as I still only have a 100 litre brewer. Using conventional methods, I use 2lt of compost per brew; it is fed with a starter and then brewed for 24hrs – the process is slow.

I am still applying the tea with a back pack. Application rates are approximately 10 plants to a litre, so one brew does 1000 plants. Clearly the larger the plant, the more compost tea it needs.

The brewer has two aerating mechanisms –  The principle one as the base of the tank. The second being a pipe that is placed into the compost basket itself. The air is blown through the compost to circulate the water in the tank through the medium and extract microbes and nutrients from it. The process unfortunately also blows a lot of organic particles into suspension in the resultant tea. The larger particles tend to block the nozzle of the sprayer with annoying regularity. Additional filters will reduce the problem but it will be essential when I move to a tractor based system.

When Kirsten Jensen came to the farm In February she had a number of issues with pests. Voles was one – hares another. I have had a muntjac deer in the site this winter. It was not in the plantation for long, but it grazed many plants – nipping the branches in two and reducing many of the 2013 young plants by 50% down to 30cm  high. This I think will have the result in new stems. The damage to the more mature plants by comparison is slight.

There are also a number of nests of vapourer moth (Orgyia Antiqua) caperpillars. As reported last year, these have a capacity to strip a mature plant in a week. Vigilance is the tool but as the moths are a common insect within Hamford Water this is a pest that will always be an issue. There also appears to be a number of months when infection arrives through the summer.

The spotted wing fruit fly ( Drosophila suzuki ) is seen as a potential serious problem for the whole soft fruit industry. It will also impact on hedgerow fruit, cherries, grapes and even olives. ( Apparently there are now olive farms in the UK). Talking with some one from the Horticultural Development Council yesterday it is good sometimes to put these things into perspective. Agriculture always has had a “new” weed or pest that has arrived and posed to be a threat to the whole of the industry. In the past these threats have been met by chemical solutions. Now however there are issues as many chemicals have either come to the end of their production license period or have been withdrawn as a result of EU regulation. Bio-science is looking to create natural alternatives  but as with all development this will take time. Spotted wing fruit fly poses the current threat to the whole of Europe so there is a significant focus upon it. I grow sea buckthorn at Devereux farm using organic methods so meeting this challenge is daunting.

The revolution for Devereux farm this year will be putting the back pack sprayer; the shovel and monkey claw away and mechanising all field operations. When one looks to having equipment designed for the purpose timing is sometimes an issue so patience is required. The first of these will be the arrival of the green waste mulch spreader with its tractor. The tractor will spawn a series of purchases through the year so allow mechanisation to fully develop. As a sustainable crop there needs to be thought put to reducing the use of fossil fuels as much as possible and i look forward to the time when electric vehicles will become an option for orchard work.

The other development this year has to be in mechanically assisted harvesting. Branch cutting and freezing is going to be the area of development but again for sustainability purposes there needs to be a focus in the long term on how to optimise resource use in harvesting and processing.  This year the crop may be around 1-2 tons of berries allowing for experimentation. So investing in a freezing facility may not be the right option. Hiring in is probably a better solution. Branch cutting needs to be as efficient as possible, allowing branches to be cut to fit into freezing boxes that can be carted off field for chilling down as soon as possible to prevent nutrient loss.

All this comes at a time when new product development is also in the mind. Over 1 ton of berries may not be a huge harvest but it is also a real opportunity for getting some taste testing done in the market in 2015.

It looks like a busy year ahead.

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Politics, product and sea buckthorn

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This blog is about sea buckthorn, but it is not possible in the UK at the moment to ignore the forthcoming election. Last night the BBC screened their head to head debate between the opposition parties. Both on this program and the following Question time politicians ignored pleas for direct answers to direct questions. Ben then trawled through the election manifestos of the principle parties. Conservatives offer a lengthy document but this is a wordy document that does not answer the direct questions as to how the government intends to reduce the £1.4 trillion debt the UK finds itself in. The labour party manifesto is short and lacking. By comparison UKIP seem to have done a lot of homework. But for me staying in Europe and being part of it on the inside is still an essential. Sea buckthorn is a European crop with a European community of growers. Not part of the EU would not change this, but at a time when the world is becoming politically unstable maintaining a solid EU block is important. Leaving the EU provides a scenario of change at a time when economic stability is essential. Politics needs to change in the UK, but having survived the potential breakup of the UK last year change needs to be a controlled development not a forced one. As an SME that looks to expansion in the next three years; with a need to work with Europeans; with a need to grow my income and capacity to invest in research; with an eye to both develop new product and export it  I will vote for stability – economic, political, environmental and social.

Europe is not always a friend. EU regulation in the field of nutrition especially in the area of innovation is not constructive. This week figures emerge to indicate that research is moving out of Europe in the area of developing food products which offer digestive health claims. Cost and risk is just too high with an indication that the US is an easier market to work in.

The inference of this pushes companies to rely on consumers to look at the label and ingredients and then go away and research what benefits there might be from specialist product. This is all very well but we are all aware that internet searches can provide results of varied accuracy. Have regulators gone too far? What we need is quality research remaining in Europe, providing consumers with quality innovation that improves diets.  Going back to politics – this blog must come across as repetitive, but politicians do not seem to understand the message that health and nutrition are linked. UK politicians are obsessed with the concept of the NHS, but fail to take on the issue that poor diet delivers a huge amount of custom to the NHS that could be reduced if nutrition was taken seriously.

In developing my sea buckthorn business I recognise that I must deliver consistent quality to my customers. I am told that customers do not care about detail. I believe that they will provide loyalty – or repeat purchase only if the product they buy gives them what they are looking for. Value for money is the key.

So consistency and value are my key targets. As a grower of the crop that will provide some of my product i understand how difficult it is to channel a natural product to be consistent in quality. Controlling this consistency will only come from on-going research to transfer nutrient quality from the plant to the consumer. This research will come at a cost but it adds value to product.

Value in product comes in a number of ways. Sea buckthorn has a capacity to deliver benefits. As a consumer since 2009 of sea buckthorn oil capsules I believe in this. As a family we use it and appreciate it. Those that we talk to about it – try it, take it and commit to it.  Sea buckthorn also has a new taste sensation. Scottish sea buckthorn is carving out a market based on taste in juice, pastries, chocolate. These products are not being sold on the basis of benefit. This is the market of now, but ignoring the benefits that can be derived from sea buckthorn is ignoring hundreds of years of experience.

As functional food and drink companies withdraw their new product focus on europe regulation should not and must not become a barrier to innovation and new product development. Small companies need to be resourceful to deliver product with benefit to consumers. For me, that can mean developing product with exceptional taste, it can also mean recognising the potential offered by the nutritional quality.

Nutritional quality is not a matter of a single analysis of a product. Quality varies in natural products dependent upon environmental factors; how it is processed, manufactured and stored. Understanding these issues requires on-going analysis to recognise how variable individual nutrient concentration might be; the factors playing upon them and whether or whether not one can control them.

Does this matter? Do consumers care? Will it make a difference to the final product?

I would say it does matter. It does matter because consumers want to know that the product they buy is what they expect. Maybe they do not care about every detail, but they do want to know that the supply chain is committed to delivering the best product at the best value for their customer. The issue is about developing and bringing to market a product in which customers trust – delivered by a service which customers appreciate, understand and value.

Going back to where I started – trust; appreciation; understanding and valuing people – that is what I look for in politicians.

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Do we value food?

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The start of this last week has my diary filled in with daily sea buckthorn field work. The chief outstanding job being the clearing of grass weeds around the German and Finnish plants. This is still a hand job with a monkey’s claw, clearly approx. 2m square around each plant. So the plan is to do 4 plants at the start of the day; 4 at the end. Of the 180 in this group, half are now done. The objective is to clear the grass and then replace with 25mm green waste based compost. I expect the compost to keep the weeds down reducing competition for the sea buckthorn for nutrients. It will also improve the organic content in the soil. Interestingly though the german and finnish plants have not had the same branch die back fungal disease issues that the Siberian plants had in 2013. Maybe this is just because they find our environment easier to adapt to, whereas the Siberian plants have to take a huge leap from continental extreme climate to coastal temperate conditions.

I digress. This last week I have not weeded eight plants per day. Tuesday I went to the International Food event (IFE) at the Excel centre in London that this year incorporates Propac as well. Visiting conferences/exhibitions means a day out when work on the farm will not be done, so it needs to be worth it.

IFE is a very international event, whereas Natural and Organic in April will focus more on UK producers. Sea buckthorn is a globally traded fruit so an international event should show some importers offering sea buckthorn product. This year I found Artic Power Berries on the Grocery Accelerator stand. Artic berries are bringing in a powdered sea buckthorn product alongside blueberry and cranberry. I saw the product as a useful ingredient for caterers and recipies. The company is Finnish in origin and has attracted a prize from Grocery Accelerator which is impressive in itself offering new companies mentoring and financial investment support. It would have been good to have seen more sea buckthorn at the event but there are a remarkable number of high nutrient fruit based drink products on offer. But these are all using what I would consider conventional fruit ingredients – one could add the growing interest in vegetable based juice. This concept is interesting at a time when sugar in drinks is under scrutiny.

Press on the European food Safety Agency (EFSA) activity in the past few weeks has been focusing on safe limits on caffeine. Also this week it is now being taken to court by Dextra Energy from Germany following their EFSA 2012 approved claim being rescinded by EU states who are concerned about the impact of sugar consumption within their populations. At The Food and Drink Innovation Network event  in London comment was made regarding the issue that EFSA guidance is making marketing wording so dull that consumers are not being attracted to functional foods at a time when diets are still high in fats/salts and sugars.

There is that old phrase – we learn more and more about less and less until we know everything about nothing. It seems that as we focus more on trying to provide consumers with the “perfect” diet; the safest foods; we are actually missing the point that people just need good quality nutrient rich food ingredients.

On Wednesday my sea buckthorn trial project partners – InCrops enterprise hub based at the University of East Anglia had their final conference as the Incrops project was coming to an end.  One of the presenters, who has a family in farming but is now very much involved in Eu and government policy focused upon how the world was to be fed within the concept of rising populations. Diets are changing worldwide. In China poultry consumption has increased 1500%; meat 170%. Over the last 30 years crop yields have increased 30% but by using only 3% more landmass. Against this population has increased by 31%. within a context of greenhouse gas emissions that are driving climate change agriculture in the Uk accounts for 12% which is twice as much as emissions from the transport industry. The stats got worse. 1.3 billion tons of food waste – accounting for 24% of all calories produced. Against this we see farming falling in profitability. We waste more but are not prepared to pay for it. We do not value food. How does this square off with EFSA saying that companies must promote functional foods with such dull marketing that consumers are just not taking up the message. I come back to my past point that while the National health Service views food in hospitals as irrelevant to health then we have confusion as to whether food influences health.  I came away from the InCrops conference thinking that we do not value food – that is why we are willing to waste it.

I must return to sea buckthorn. The more I view our contradictory approach to delivering food into the market, the more I feel that sea buckthorn has a real place as its high nutrient content has been appreciated for centuries.The fact that botanicals are complex  and difficult to study does not make them an ingredient source that should not be at the forefront of delivering good diet and good health to consumers.

But who am I to say – I am only a farmer.

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Natural by name, not natural by management

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As the sun rises higher and spring approaches more of the Siberian varieties are showing signs of life. Like a theatrical performance Klaudia was first onto the stage as usual this year. Next to show was Augustina – although|I doubt whether this correlates with it being an earlier harvesting variety. Elizaveta is now chasing these two and looks as if it will show more leaf than Klaudia shortly. This leaves all the rest which are all on the move, even if one describes it as just a modest bud crack. What is good is to see Gnom coming on in time with all the rest. As the male I hope that this indicates a good development sync for pollination.

Following Kirsten Jensen’s visit her intructions are being followed. First of all the large and mature German plants have been pruned. Having left these to develop too far it followed instructions to a level but still possibly needs some extra intervention this week, as I lost courage with some plants which had a serious haircut. The other part of the instruction at this stage was to strip the grass away from the plants. So a 1 square metre area has appeared around two thirds of the plants. It is relatively easy work with a monkey’s claw as the grass is still dormant and roots pull from the soil without too much effort.

Off the field there has been some fireworks. I read with some alarm that the Medicine and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) has forced the withdrawal of 107 St John’s Wort products from Amazon. The action seems to have been a reaction to health benefit claims being made by sellers. The MHRA state their remit to enforce the Nutrtional and health Claims regulations is not only regarding what is on packaging but also what is said in personal testimonials and on websites.

As someone who is developing a business ( in fact more than that – our farm’s future ) on crop and product derived from botanicals that are high in bioactive compounds it is clear that regulatory compliance guide how we develop our products.

The problem with the EFSA regulations and the European Food Safety Agency approach always has been that the complexities of multi bioactive botanicals do not behave in a regulated fashion. Grown in a natural environment, products derived from plants are subject to environmental variables. The way the bioactives synergise produces thousands of options as to the actual pathways that these might interact with the body once consumed. The issue, as I see it is that many of these botanicals have been used for centuries. These traditional uses have created an understanding as to the potential benefits. Traditional use also throws up side effects. So knowledge is based on observation and practical experience. I would contest that many pharmaceutical drugs are licensed for specific use but their use is not without side effects. Even the mainstays of ibroprufen/ paracetomol and aspirin are in this category.

This regulatory activity has its roots in poor market behaviour. Poor quality product or product that risks overdose. Product that claimed too much. Product that did not deliver on claims. All these resulted in EFSA regulation demanded by politicians and consumer groups.

I go back to what we learnt from the Food Matters Live event in London last year. Consumers are not really interested in what is on the label. They want; they expect; they demand that what is in the title is what is in the bottle. So it is up to the producer to know that what they are selling will be in the bottle.

Some product can deliver an image of quality to a consumer through an accreditation stamp. Accreditation though is only as good as the monitoring system that goes with it. It really comes down to the quality of management of the product throughout its whole life cycle. Accreditation can lead consumers to a false level of confidence if product creating has weak points in the chain.

The description of “local” within product marketing is often misleading as local in an era of efficient transport and distribution can still deliver high quality product from hundreds of miles away. What is probably more important is the number of links in the supply chain. The more people that become accountable the higher the risk that quality is not monitored with rigour. a short supply chain is not always perfect, because what one is looking for is a refined personal chain of responsibility. If the delivery of product is through a huge organisation, then sometimes that can introduce weak links.

I do believe that accreditation is a useful tool for the consumer. Accreditation must fit with the standards required to be delivered. Those standards must be deliverable. Then the producer is accountable.

I see sea buckthorn as having had its centuries of testing through practical human experience. The necessity now is to deliver it in a way that regulators remain happy and consumers retain access to a high quality product that delivers all they see in what they want.

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Value – who pays for it

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There is something very special about this time of year. Cold nights remind you that it is maybe still winter, but as I wandered through the sea buckthorn there were those tell tale signs of spring which shout that a new year is on the way.
This new year is going to be a dynamic one.
Up until now the trials have been developing in size, scale and complexity. In 2012 the plants were establishing and I viewed them as strong and having a capacity to grow whatever the conditions. 2013 there was more maturity but trying to keep weed growth under control was becoming an issue. I wanted to grow without chemicals so the only option was manual and my goodness, manual takes time. Time was not on my time and the weeds out competed the sea buckthorn, plant stress levels became un-sustainable and 40% of the crop fell under a serious attack of fungal disease. 2014 that problem had to be resolved. Resolved it was with the use of mulch and a compost tea brewer. The plants responded with vigour. Stress levels fell, disease did not re-emerge.
The concept works but it was all manual. The compost was shovelled from a trailer behind by car. 60kg per plant and 5000 plants takes a huge amount of time. The compost tea brewer was a great concept start, but having to feed the compost first; then brew the tea, in a machine that could only supply enough for 800 plants at a time created delays so timing of applications was not ideal.
So this year, the priority is for the site to be mechanised. The mulch needs an applicator, which is being designed and built as I write. The compost tea will now be ready made with no brew delay. Having a tractor on site means that my garden mower will go home and a robust tractor mower allow for the intercrop to be cut and controlled. Timely applications means less stress for the plants, and more time for management.
Add to that the advice from Kirsten Jensen from our UK Sea buckthorn event last month – buy a finger weeder to slice out the broad leaved weeds that plague the edge of the mulch strip.
All this together makes 2015 feel like real progress even before it has started.

But in the background there is the concept that this has to turn into a business.
Sea buckthorn is not a crop that will grow without careful management. Harvest is still a challenge – although that is the next project after completion of the mulch applicator. Investment in time, land, plants, machinery, management time all package to a cost.

In consumer terms everyone is looking for value. Value in the amount paid against the benefit the product provides. But value is not just a consumer issue. Value is delivered by a supply chain and is regulated by markets. Excess of supply over demand creates falling prices. When markets were local costs were more direct. Labour costs were comparable. Production costs within a country are impacted by the same energy market; the same competitive transport costs; common regulations. Once one goes global costs are not comparable. Global markets are in some senses good for the consumer because the most efficient producers gain the business that can deliver product at the lowest cost. There can even be environmental gains. Growing fresh food in East Africa and taking advantage of natural sunlight energy outweighs domestic high energy consuming alternatives. But low cost has hidden costs.

Costs of production are only low because values are different. If labour costs are low, it means that people are being paid less – an obvious statement but the result of that is a lower standard of living. if governments subsidise its national traders it means that it is difficult for competing business in other countries to succeed so choice to consumers reduces. If standards of production are lowered to reduce costs then quality becomes variable and for consumers – you get what you pay for. What is alarming is that whereas the global agricultural industry is under pressure to produce value at low cost the products of the industry are becoming an increasing target for crime.
We are told that organised crime is operating in the food supply industry to the global turn of $49 billion. Possibly 10% of US food could be adulterated.
As the global population grows so will the demand for food and this problem will potentially on get worse. This at a time when household budgets are squeezed. The impact of this on the global market is stark when one looks at Fairtrade figures that have fallen 3.7%, reducing the low back to fairtrade producers by £1.67 billion. Fairtrade, as with organic does represent a premium value and in an age of the rise of discount stores these types of traditional value adding, ethical based may be losing touch with the market.

If discount stores are the traders by choice on the High Street for the next ten years then value is not something to be marketed. Value must be inherent in the product. So does that question the need for brands.
Brands represent the value that is not in the product title. Brands represent the connection with the customer and the producer. If the connection is good and delivers value in information and trust then brand has value.

It is the consumer who pays for value and choses what is value. As a producer of sea buckthorn I totally believe that my product has inherent natural value. The job is to show the consumer why my product has value and why they should buy it.

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Academic/SME partnerships

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Sea buckthorn is a plant that has been studied worldwide with focus on its taxonomy; its genetics; its agronomy; its processing; the potential benefits form its consumption and so on. For all of this it remains relatively unheard of in the UK. In the last decade cranberry, blueberry and pomegranate have come to the fore, but for why?

The sea buckthorn community globally focuses strongly on production; on the development of new varieties; on processing technique; on biochemistry within the berry and recent in the leaf. The crop is grown in Europe, but for local and national markets, with more significant crops in Asia also being focused upon internal not international markets. The UK is a country that imports most of its needs. Sea buckthorn has lost out to the US investment in cranberry, and pomegranate with blueberry emerging as a fruit that is now common as a fresh offering on supermarket shelves. A product will not develop unless it is available in consistent volume, quality and price. Mature competitive markets like the UK are also possibly supplied by risk averse companies who invest where they can calculate sales volumes rather than on whether they can develop markets.

But sea buckthorn has quality. It has centuries of traditional use. Its bioactive compound mix fits with market interest. Its taste is new, fresh and unique.

So how does one break into a market. The UK consumer is sophisticated, understands value, and has a level of cynicism about marketeers. The recession has been rolling from 2008 and product now has to deliver value for money and be affordable. Sea buckthorn is already in the marketplace and internet sites of Amazon and ebay offer price points that have discounts that one has to consider are not earning the seller much or any profit.

In such a market product is not unique. Product by name may vary in presentation, in composition and in price. Internet sales are not conventional retail outlets. The stark presentation of multiple sellers offering the same product at varied price stretches consumer loyalty to particular brand. But price is not everything. The debate about why so few people switch energy companies or banks is an example. Brands do make a difference because they are the guarantee of quality – of the delivery of consumer benefit – the same consumer benefit that when matched with consumer need creates a sale. It is the feeling of confidence in brand that creates repeat sales and that is the bond of trust that I would look for when selling a product.

A bond of trust comes from confidence and an understanding that the product delivers what it says it will.
With a natural product – or a product that has come from a natural not wholely manufactured environment, there are complications. The growing environment has many variables, many of which are difficult to predict or manage. These can and will alter the quality of a commodity. when we are looking at creating a product from a natural commodity that inherently has variable qualities this demands that the commodity is managed in such a way as to reduce the impact of these variables. It also demands that the supply chain that takes the grown commodity through to the consumer treats the product flow with the same attention to detail to nurture and protect the natural qualities that the consumer expects from the product.

This takes me to the title of this blog. Farming has been through a number of revolutions that have driven its productivity. Mechanisation; improving fertilisers; managing pests and diseases; better varieties and genetics all have led to this point in time.
The realisation that feeding the global population never used to be a problem is now changing. There is becoming less land available and productivity is not lifting sufficiently to meet the demands of the future.

The term sustainability used to be one that was the language of the environmentalist. It is now the language of the politician and policy maker. It is becoming a term that needs to convert into practical activity to create an equilibrium in the growing environment. An environment where the soil becomes a capital asset no different to money in the bank. The soil has the ability to add value to our agricultural management. It has the ability to reduce the impact of the variables that impact on our natural commodities. The variables that influence the qualities that consumers look for – or even demand when they look for product.

This is not easy. It is not a quick fix. For fifty years, maybe a hundred we have relied on easy gains from science and development. Now the stakes are higher and the needs are greater.

Delivering consistent quality in reliable quantity requires detailed understanding of the processes we manage. This understanding will take time, but time will deliver the knowledge necessary to improve quality.

Quality is a vague word but in the realm of food and diet we now know that quality does count. Obesity, diabetes, cardio vascular disease – all quantified as diseases with links to diet. Stress and lifestyle are other factors but coming back to agriculture and growers we need to understand the need to deliver not quantity into the market, but quantities of quality and meet needs that provide for the health of nations.

As a grower I am not a scientist. I do not have the knowledge nor facilities to undertake my own research that can hone my growing sea buckthorn crop into one that delivers the quality that I have written about. But I know my potential consumers will want to know my product is what is says it is. I also know that I need to be continually improving what I can offer based on understanding how to get the best out of a crop and what it can offer a customer.

Regulation will prevent me from describing the qualities I seek. But that should be no barrier to seeking knowledge and improving the offering to the consumer.

That is where seeking professional academic partnership becomes important. There has been some press recently regarding the bias that these partnerships might create. If a company pays a researcher to provide research does it corrupt the researcher? There are no guarantees that research results will provide what one wants to hear. If the product that is delivered through research that is poor and manipulated by marketing, the most significant test is whether the consumer and trade press will accept the research and the product as having the qualities it promotes. If research is peer reviewed it has value. it has value to the researcher to gain respect; it adds value to any resultant product to gain market trust; it create consumer loyalty to the brand of the company that brings the resultant product to market.

So coming back to sea buckthorn – to develop the market in a competitive world peer reviewed research is the key to success. It costs in time; in resources; in cashflow; but it will bring long term respect and relationship with market and consumer.

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Risk and resources – marketing issues for sea buckthorn

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Our meeting last Saturday introduced some other concepts that impact upon the need for integrated production for sea buckthorn.

The nature of the crop at the moment is largely foraged and small scale. The implications of this are seasonality and how does one turn fresh berry into product. Harvesting also has issues.

Seasonality is a concept that is rare in today’s market where crops are grown all over the world. Growing crops abroad often encourages questioning of environmental credibility. The logic of flying crops in from distant lands only becomes apparent when it is compared to the significant costs and use of energy to guarantee high yield in cool climate. Consumers want to pay as little as possible for their produce and that needs intensive farming. Carbon footprints will become increasingly important in the future and energy saving use and farming methods that reduce carbon emissions will be part of that.

We often want to see our products produced locally and foraged crops tick that box very well, but what does local mean?

Local in many minds means in the same village or within the area of the town that you live in. But in terms of food production it is now possible to harvest product fresh and move it to market within hours because of our transport infrastructure. So local does not always guarantee the only form of delivery of fresh quality.
Local can also be perceived as an understanding that it comes from a farmer or small producer that one knows or can associate with.
This cuts through the issue of distance and places the concept into trust in the producer. Trust to deliver a fresh and quality product.
Identifying with a person – even a named farmer is important because it creates and is a transparent form of traceability. It associates the consumer with the producer and the land that the product has come from.

This is possibly different for a restaurant as so many now advertise their use of local produce. In reality what does that mean? Many grow their own vegetables and herbs, some even their own meat. That is truly local.
That is true to its meaning, but the desire to use local in this context provides the chef with quality that is absolute. Quality that is quantifiable and that provides the best opportunity to maximise taste and flavour in a dish.

Quality keeps coming into the equation when thinking about food supply from a small business. It is the USP that the producer can offer and that the consumer looks for.

But for a small producer there is often a barrier in product development. Small production does not fit well with modern food processing technology and equipment. The availability of machinery to pasteurise in ways that protects nutrients and taste exists but unless you are lucky it will not be local to a producer. These machines also are expensive and therefore throughput is important. Small producers have small volumes of produce to process and this does not fit well with the capacity of many processing machines. So often the ability to access the best technology that can sympathetically process high quality foods is limited.

I have been impressed at sea buckthorn conferences by the ability of some small producers to develop their products. This comes about because of access to new product development facilities that are cost effective. In particular are the facilities offered in Manitoba, Canada where small producers can hire facilities and technical support to develop and bring their product to market. This requires government aid and revenue support. In this case the facility is also tied into the University of Manitoba which helps to bring technical assistance to the opportunity the facility provides.

Small business is often resourceful because it has to be.

An article last week by Julian Mellentin of the New Nutrition Business brought this to relevance for sea buckthorn.
Small business lack resources so they are more targeted when looking to markets. Targeting specific consumers creates connection and loyalty. These sort of consumers are probably more self motivated, they might represent a niche market, but that is enough for an SME to need as a start-up.
The internet age has reduced marketing costs and product launch risk so accessing consumers directly through their mobile phones creates opportunity for sales and growth.
SME’s are by their nature personal enterprises. They are driven by personalities with great belief in their product. Restricted resources and high risk can be managed by taking time to develop a market. Speciality food is not a get rich quick business.
Taking a product into a market that does not know you or your product is high risk. Excepting it to provide quick return compounds this issue. Development at a pace that is able to grow resources that can then be re-allocated to expand the business minimises the risk. It takes longer but is more secure.
How long did it take CocoCola to become what it is today – a start up from pre world war one?

So this is the model that I see for sea buckthorn. Slow and certain, built on strength; built on quality; and a defined focus on the consumer trust, need and willingness to pay.