Sector council ratification vote 2025

George farms the family farm just south of York with his father, Stephen. They run 550 pedigree Meatlinc ewes lambing in April, producing around 120 Meatlinc rams for sale each year, operating a grass-based system with all progeny performance recorded through Signet. They also buy 100 dairy cross reared calves a year, grazing them on a mixed grazing platform with the sheep, rotationally grazing them around semi-permanent grass pastures. Their aim is to produce 500 kg stores by the autumn, to be finished by a local contract finisher. The aim of their ruminant enterprise is to maximise the performance of grassland through improved management and the selection of genetics that are suited to this system. They also have a 32,000-bird free-range egg unit, producing high-quality eggs direct to a major supermarket. All the muck from the unit is used on grassland behind the rotation, reducing their fertiliser costs to virtually nil.

Their other main enterprise is Lindum Turf, growing around 800 acres of high-quality turf for landscaping, leisure and sports. They also have a soil-less turf product for use on corporate events or film studios, as well as growing wildflower and sedum turf for various projects around the UK and Europe. Their aim is to be innovative and produce high-quality products, working with customers to help their businesses whether that be ram customers or garden designers.

Bryan and his wife Liz took over a 150-acre farm in North Devon in 1984. They have steadily added and developed it into the 320-acre business they own and run today. Bryan and Liz have always focused on conventional beef and lamb production, selling finished stock through live markets and direct to abattoirs. Over several decades, their enthusiasm for a deeper understanding of livestock production has led to their involvement in many tests, trials and research projects, including the earliest beginnings of faecal egg counting, commercial drug trials, benchmarking and most recently the SFI pilot. They have visited and toured farms in Canada, Uruguay, Australia and New Zealand and remain in contact with some of those farmers.

Thirty years of involvement in the National Sheep Association, culminating in three years as national chair, hugely increased Bryan’s knowledge of the great diversity that exists within livestock farming throughout the UK. As chair of various committees, he has learned the importance of pragmatism and compromise. Bryan has become familiar with many of the organisations that influence, govern and regulate beef and lamb production. He has had the opportunity to represent UK sheep farmers on forums ranging from local discussion groups to Westminster and abroad in Bulgaria and South America.

Ghulam Khan (Gama) is currently at Shazan Foods Ltd, working closely with key stakeholders within the halal retail/wholesale sector supply chains and is involved in their development and alignment to meet current and future halal customer/market/brand requirements/needs.

He received his BSc (Wales), MSc/PhD in Food & Agriculture from the University of Reading and has been active in the areas of research and development, manufacturing and retail for the last 30 years. His experience includes raw material sourcing, supply chain setup/integrity, standards, auditing, product/market range development.

Polly is a mixed organic tenant farmer in South Wales. The farm enterprises include a beef suckler herd, 500 Romney ewes and 80 ha of organic cereals in rotation. There is also a small organic pig unit to supply the farm butchery and meat box delivery business.

Polly is passionate about increasing the farm's cereal yields without causing a detriment to the existing ecology on the farm. The farm hosts regular school visits, with primary schools in inner town Barry, to get the next generation passionate and enthusiastic about food and farming.

Adam is managing director and a shareholder of CD Farming Limited, a joint-venture farming business based in West Suffolk. Working on behalf of numerous landowners, CDF provides farming and environmental services over a large acreage spread over a seven-mile radius from its base. In addition, Adam is a director at Camgrain Stores Ltd, the UK’s larger co-operative grain storage facility in which he and his farming partners are heavily invested. In 2018 he completed the Worshipful Company of Farmers business management course and is also a BASIS-qualified agronomist.

By joining the sector council, he hopes to drive value out of the levy on behalf of growers, securing value for money in ever more difficult financial landscape farmers work within. A big believer in collaboration and farmers working together he believes AHDB is a route for farmers to strengthen their hand within the supply chain both internally and in the export market.

Bob has retired from a career in the malting industry where his primary responsibility was the procurement of malting barley and other grains for maltings in the UK, Germany and Poland. Other responsibilities included energy procurement and risk management. During his career Bob has represented the malting industry on various industry-wide bodies including the former AHDB Cereals & Oilseeds Board and the Recommended List Barley, Oats and other Cereals crop committee, and the working parties that inaugurated the Assured Combinable Crops Scheme (Red Tractor) and Scottish Quality Cereals.

Since retiring he has been working with the Royal Norfolk Agricultural Association on sustainable food production and wider food education. Bob hopes to use his position on the Cereals & Oilseeds Sector Council to not only represent the interests of the malting industry but also to further the movement towards sustainable food production both environmentally and economically.

Sarah brings many years of experience in the grain and feed industry to this new role. She has been a self-employed consultant since 1999, and clients have included organisations involved in trade in grain, feed, rice, general produce, essential oils and animal health products. Prior to this, she was Trade Policy Manager at the Grain and Feed Trade Association (Gafta), based in London. Her first job was as an economist at the Home-Grown Cereals Authority, where she specialised on trade policy issues and world trade rules, as well as the development of the UK S&D tables.

Sarah gained her BSc (Hons) in Agriculture in 1987, after which she did a Masters degree in Agricultural Economics at Reading University. Throughout her career, she has worked on many challenging issues that affect the arable sector and has worked hard to coordinate different viewpoints into a consensual point for action. She has worked with Defra on various committees involved in the development of UK agricultural policy, and worked with the cereals supply chain, from farmers to end-processors, on advising policy-makers following the Brexit vote.

Mike, along with his brother, is a director of the 1,325-acre family-run farming business in South Gloucestershire, whose Kingspool herd consist of 700 pedigree Holsteins. They were winners of the RABDF/NMR Gold Cup in 2010 and the Cream Award for zero lameness and welfare in 2021.

The herd is high output/welfare, all year-round calving, seasonal grazing, supplying 10 million litres on a premium retail contract, that requires industry-leading welfare and environmental standards. The closed herd uses sexed genomic sires, with replacements entering the herd at an average 23.5 months, bred from the top 25% of the herd. The remainder of the herd are bred to beef to supply a retail-based beef scheme.

Mike sits on the council of RABDF, represents them on the Dairy UK farmers Forum; he is also a board member of M&S Dairy Farmers.

Rob farms in partnership with his family, milking 220 cows on a robotic system in Devon, rearing all the followers to finished on as much home-grown feed as possible. He is passionate about the dairy industry and has been involved as an Arla farmer representative, holding many different positions over the last five years. This experience has been a valuable insight into the industry and the various challenges it presents, particularly in the ever-changing global climate.

With a background in agricultural engineering, he has also spent time in the USA on a dairy and arable farm, giving him different and valuable perspectives on the industry. He would like to see AHDB involved in more industry collaboration and to highlight the nutritional density of the food we produce.

In addition to highlighting the nutritional value of dairy, Rob is also particularly interested in the need to help educate consumers about the positive environmental credentials of the sector. He wants consumers to have a greater understanding of the positive work UK dairy farmers are doing in contributing to feeding the world in an efficient and sustainable way.

Gemma is a fourth-generation farmer at the 350-acre South Hellescott Farm in North Petherwin, Cornwall, where she has a pedigree Holstein herd of 120 cows. In 2018 she launched her own brand, Cornish Moo, which is now a multi award-winning brand with a priority on reconnecting the public with the understanding of where food comes from, showing the whole chain and ability to buy local, honest food just as it should be.

An NFU National Dairy Board member, she is passionate about the future of agriculture and reconnecting consumers to where their food comes from, with a focus on educating children and re-engaging people with milk. Gemma’s work in the industry has earned her multiple accolades, including Outstanding Achievement at the 2021 South West Farmers Awards, and Young Farmer of the Year at the 2022 National Arable and Grassland Awards.

Jodie holds the position as Head of Livestock and External Sales at Morrisons, working for the Woodhead Bros business since 2011 where she has covered a variety of roles in the meat sector. Her current role sees her lead the livestock sourcing team for beef, pork and lamb – the external sales business and lead projects and agricultural relationships for the red meat sectors. Jodie has a particular passion for animal welfare, and believes this has an important part to play in our point of difference as a nation.

Jodie’s direct links with the Morrisons retail and agricultural teams bring a new dynamic to the pork sector council. She is looking forward to bringing her wider knowledge across other agricultural sectors, her trading experience in retail and her recent MBA qualification and retail knowledge, to offer a breadth of understanding to take the industry into a new era of change.

Jodie, who was brought up on a dairy farm in Malhamdale, North Yorkshire, wants to make sure that the British pig industry is one that will be around in years to come and to ensure the future is bright.

Hugh is well known and respected in the UK pig industry and has more than 40 years of commercial experience in supplying technology to farmers. He joined the Pork Council in May 2022. Having gained a first-class honours degree at Reading University, Hugh continued with postgraduate research into thermal performance in pig buildings. He was a founder member of Farmex Ltd. in 1980, and the company has gone on to become the market leader in ventilation systems for pig production in the UK. Three-time winner of the New Equipment Award at the British Pig & Poultry Fair, Farmex is now at the forefront of real-time production monitoring in the UK and the USA.

Hugh has led three UK Research and Innovation (UKRI)-funded collaborative R&D projects and is active in the field of precision livestock farming and the application of information and communication technology (ICT) in agriculture. He is now the sole owner of Farmex Ltd. and a co-owner/director of Dicam Technology Ltd. Additionally, Hugh is a Fellow of the Institution of Agricultural Engineers and was recently awarded a Lifetime Fellowship of the National Pig Association (NPA).

Born in Norfolk, Becca moved to Suffolk for a one-year industrial placement with BQP as part of an agriculture degree at Harper Adams University. She was fortunate to be offered a graduate position with them and over the next 14 years, held a variety of roles across the trials and commercial teams, working closely with customers, and ultimately taking on responsibility for the company’s breeding and free-range production. These experiences gave her a broad and valuable insight into pig production and the wider agricultural industry.

Alongside her work at BQP, she and her husband Robert have built their own agricultural business from his 60-acre family farm in mid Suffolk. Over the past decade, they have expanded to farm 600 NZ Romney breeding ewes and additional store lambs over winter, and also developed pig growing accommodation for 5,500 wean-to-finish places, operating two two-stage production systems. Becca now works part-time in her family business and part-time for Rattlerow Farms as an account manager in the sales team.