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PRESENTERS AND FACILITATORS AT THE INFORMATION MEETING ON PRODUCER ORGANISATIONS ORGANISED BY DAFM RECENTLY
An information meeting on producer organisations organised by DAFM was held in Backweston, Celbridge, Co Kildare on the morning of 6 February. This meeting was primarily aimed at non-producer organisation growers and other interested parties, who wished to learn more about the potential value and benefits of participating in producer
organisations. This meeting was the first of a series of proposed meetings, to facilitate a better understanding of the producer organisation scheme. The follow up workshops will take place shortly at the Department's Backweston campus involving discussions between interested producers, representatives from the two existing POs and DAFM. The aim will be to facilitate further information sharing about the structure and operation of POs and potential benefits and opportunities that exist through participation in POs. ✽
NURSERY STOCK MEETING The spring nursery stock meeting was held in Portlaoise on 7 March. It was very well attended and a lot of good discussion followed, in particular in relation to damage from Storm Emma and a new plant health initiative. Sinéad Kelly from the Department of Agriculture gave an overview of the bacterial pathogen, Xylella fastidiosa. Neil Helyer from Fargro covered IPM strategies for the coming season and introduced some new pests to watch out for. Andrew Wilson discussed the precise use of controlled release fertilisers and finally Dónall Flanagan, Teagasc introduced the Irish Plant Health Initiative. This was developed by the Department of Agriculture,Teagasc, the Irish Hardy Nursery Stock Association and Bord Bia. It sets out five actions growers should take to improve their response to plant health concerns, not least Xylella. Growers can sign up to the scheme, using it to improve their biosecurity and to build customer confidence. See the Teagasc website for more details www.teagasc.ie/horticulture. .✽
MUSHROOM GROWERS EMBRACING LEAN FARM PROGRAMME The Commercial Mushroom Producers Organisation has launched the Lean Farm Programme for mushroom growers. Lean is about driving continuous improvement to enable businesses to be operating more efficiently. A lean pilot programme was introduced to the mushroom sector in 2016 as the industry faltered following Brexit. The pilot programme was a success with savings identified in the areas of product giveaway, harvesting, growing, energy, people management, planning/forecasting and benchmarking. CMP (commercial mushroom producers) have taken the initiative by Incorporating lean into their operational programme and have achieved EU grant aid approval to roll out a lean farm programme to any
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A RECENT MEETING OF THE COMMERCIAL MUSHROOM PRODUCERS ORGANISATION
mushroom farm who wants to introduce lean practices. Teagasc is taking a lead role in the Lean Programme by organising and coordinating the programme and also by doing an assessment on each unit to identify the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. So far, nine farms have started the lean programme with eight more farms ready to sign up. The programme will run up until the end of 2018 with the aim of continuing the programme into the future. ✽
/ www.horticultureconnected.ie / Spring 2018
