AHDB recruitment privacy notice

This notice explains how the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board (AHDB) collects and uses personal information during recruitment.

Last updated: 10 April 2026

AHDB is the UK’s statutory levy board for agriculture and horticulture. We are a non‑departmental public body set up under the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board Order 2008 (as amended).

In this notice, “we”, “us” and “our” mean AHDB.

We:

• Do not sell your personal information
• Treat sensitive business information as confidential
• Use your information only in ways you would reasonably expect

This notice applies if you apply to work with us as:

• An employee
• A worker
• A contractor or consultant
• An intern, apprentice or work‑experience candidate

It applies whether you apply:

• Directly through our website
• Via a recruitment agency
• Through a job board
• By any other method

This notice does not cover your data once you are hired. If you join us, a separate employee privacy notice will apply.

We provide this information to meet our duties under UK data protection law, including the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR) and the Data Protection Act 2018.

This notice is for information only. It is not a job offer and is not part of any contract.

We follow data protection law. This means your personal information is:

• Used lawfully, fairly and transparently
• Collected only for clear and valid purposes
• Limited to what is necessary
• Kept accurate and up to date where needed
• Kept only as long as necessary
• Kept secure and protected from unauthorised access or loss

We may collect your personal information from:

• You (for example CVs, application forms, interviews and emails)
• Recruitment agencies
• Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS), Disclosure Scotland or AccessNI (where relevant)
• Your referees
• Public sources such as LinkedIn, professional registers or Companies House

This may include:

• Name, address, phone number and email address
• Education, qualifications and employment history
• Skills, training, languages and professional memberships
• Right to work information
• Driving licence details (where relevant)
• Equal opportunities information
• Interview notes, assessment scores and feedback
• Salary details and notice period (where relevant)
• Emails and other communications
• Technical information from online recruitment systems (such as IP address and login activity)

Some information needs extra protection. Where lawful and relevant, this may include:

• Race or ethnicity
• Religion or belief
• Gender or sexual orientation
• Health information (for example to arrange reasonable adjustments)

Providing equal opportunities information is optional and does not affect your application.

For some roles, we may need to process information about criminal convictions. This usually happens only after a job offer and only where legally allowed.

We only use your information when the law allows us to.

We use your information to:

• Assess your suitability for a role
• Communicate with you
• Arrange interviews and assessments
• Decide whether to offer you a role

We use your information to:

• Check your right to work in the UK
• Meet equality and anti‑discrimination duties
• Meet public sector and regulatory requirements

We may use your information to:

• Run an efficient recruitment process
• Keep records of recruitment decisions
• Monitor recruitment outcomes (for example diversity, at an overall level)
• Protect our legal position

As a public body, some recruitment activity supports our statutory functions and is carried out in the public interest.

We do not usually rely on consent. If we do ask for consent (for example to keep your details for future roles), you can withdraw it at any time.

We use your information to:

• Review applications
• Assess skills and experience
• Contact you about your application
• Carry out checks where needed
• Make recruitment decisions
• Keep records to show fair and lawful recruitment

If you do not provide required information (such as proof of qualifications or right to work), we may not be able to continue your application.

You may need to answer initial screening questions (for example about holding a UK driving licence).

These questions decide if you can progress your application. After this stage, decisions that significantly affect you are not made using automated systems alone.

We may share your information with:

• Recruitment agencies
• Background check and screening providers
• Referees
• Occupational health providers (where relevant)
• Legal or HR advisers
• IT and recruitment system providers
• Other organisations within our group (where needed for recruitment)

All organisations processing data for us must keep it secure and use it only on our instructions.

We may also share information where the law requires us to do so.

Some suppliers may be based outside the UK. Where this happens, we ensure suitable legal protections are in place, such as:

• UK adequacy regulations
• International Data Transfer Agreements (IDTAs)
• UK‑approved contract clauses

We use appropriate technical and organisational measures to protect your information. Access is limited to people who need it for their work.

We have procedures in place to deal with data breaches and will notify you and regulators where required.

If you are unsuccessful, we usually keep your information for 2 years after the recruitment process ends. This allows us to:

• Show fair and lawful recruitment
• Respond to legal claims

After this, we securely delete or anonymise your information.

If you are successful, your information is transferred to your personnel file and kept under our employee privacy notice.

If you agree, we may keep your details for up to 2 years to tell you about future roles. You can withdraw your consent at any time.

You have the right to:

• Access your personal information
• Correct inaccurate or incomplete information
• Ask for your information to be deleted
• Object to certain uses of your information
• Ask us to limit how we use your information
• Request your information in a portable format (where possible)

We may need to check your identity before responding. Requests are usually free unless they are excessive.

You can email our Data Protection Officer

Write to us: (For the attention of the Data Protection Officer), Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board, Middlemarch Business Park, Siskin Parkway East, Coventry, CV3 4PE.

You can also complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO)

We encourage you to contact us first so we can try to resolve any concerns.