She writes:
Despite a frosty start, NFU Dairy Adviser Verity Richards and I set off bright and early and ready for an interesting day. Taunton Racecourse proved a fantastic setting and the draw of a great line up of speakers led to over 100 dairy farmers turning up from across the South West.
The day kicked off with a session focused on animal health, disease and antibiotic usage. Andrew Butler, NFU Devon County Adviser, presented on the importance of maintaining the UKs growing reputation for high quality food and drink and high standards of animal welfare, traceability and sustainability if we are to increase overseas demand for UK product. He was followed by Lisa Morgan, a veterinary PhD student from Bristol University, who talked about the lessons she has learnt working with Farmer Action Groups to reduce antimicrobial usage on farm. The groups allow a small number of farmers to work together to review and discuss practical ways they can each reduce antimicrobial use on farm, from improving ventilation and actively discussing medicine use with vets to using lasers to lower the number of starlings gathering on farm. Bryony Symms and Geoff Ash, two local dairy farmers who took part in one of the Farmer Action Groups talked attendees through the changes they had made on farm and how this had helped them actively reduce their antibiotic usage.
After lunch the discussion moved on to coping with price volatility. Richard Counsell, a 2016 Nuffield Scholar, discussed how Nuffield had led him to the creation of Stable – a price risk insurance tool which aims to help farmers reduce the pressures of volatility through insuring against a certain degree of risk. Chris Gooderham, lead Analyst at AHDB Dairy, spoke about the need to optimise individual dairy systems to improve efficiency whilst Crediton Dairies Phil Cork talked through the launch of their new fixed price contract and what this help this can offer dairy farmers to reduce their exposure to price volatility.
The last session of the day focused on promotion, Rebecca Miah, AHDB’s Senior Consumer Marketing Manager, spoke about AHDB’s and Dairy UKs new multi-million pound consumer campaign, ‘the Department for Dairy Related Scrumptious Affairs,’ which aims to promote the natural goodness and taste of dairy to a millennial audience. Humorously mimicking a government department, this campaign will soon be rolled out across the UK, using online adverts, billboards in transport stations and high profile influencers and vloggers to raise as much awareness as possible. NFU Social Media Adviser Simon Ashby rounded off the day by encouraging the audience to use social media to create a united positive voice highlighting the importance of UK agriculture and all the good work UK dairy farmers do daily, using pictures of the beautiful British countryside, videos of animals, and telling their personal story.
Dairy in a Day successfully covered a wide range of key topics and invited lots of interesting discussion and debate from attendees. Looking ahead to the future, I felt the take away message from the day was that South West dairy farmers were prepared to face challenges head on through positive changes and collaborative action.