Lord Whitty, Defra minister who covers the fresh produce industry, opened the final phase of a £1 million top-fruit packhouse in Kent this week.
The new facility, belonging to JL Baxter & Son, is in Hunton, near Maidstone, and the final £400,000 extension unveiled this week has been specifically designed for the organic fruit of its own growers and other suppliers.
Lord Whitty said English top-fruit producers are meeting the challenges of the marketplace despite the diminishing size of their industry in recent years, supplying high quality fruit at reasonable prices. "Growers are meeting other challenges too," he added. The market for organic produce has expanded tremendously in recent years and many growers are opting to convert to organic production - in part if not in while."
He said there is no better example than Clive Baxter's Amsbury Farm of the availability of, and potential gains to be made from, grants for organic conversion, processing and marketing. "This new packhouse has been partly financed by Defra," said the minister. "Thirty per cent of the construction costs were funded through a Processing and Marketing grant from the England Rural Development Programme."
The site is unusual, as it is allowed by the Soil Association to handle both organic and conventionally-grown produce under one roof. As Baxter's organic pear throughput, combined with product from other sources, will only amount to 1,000 tonnes this season, the only Waitrose designated top-fruit packhouse in the country has been passed.
Organic fruit is handled from Monday to Wednesday, before the installation receives a thorough washdown and reverts to conventional packing and grading for the rest of the week, Clive Baxter said. He grows 100 hectares of topfruit, of which part of his 30ha of Conference pears was selected for conversion.
"We started converting our pears in 2000 and after three years, they are now fully converted organically for this season's crop," Baxter said.
No comments yet