Champion F1 driver-turned organic grower Jody Scheckter will speak at this year’s annual tomato conference in September.
Jointly organised by the Tomato Growers’ Association (TGA), HDC and Warwick HRI, the conference will take place at the Royal Court Hotel Coventry on September 28.
It will cover a broad range of issues from future energy supplies and energy and labour efficiency to the tomato scene from New Zealand and Scandinavia. There will also be a session on opportunities for local sourcing of food, achieving the British grower’s aim of pesticide-free tomato production, and an update on pepino mosaic virus.
Scheckter will speak at the conference dinner on September 27, following the TGA AGM that afternoon.
His latest project has been developing Laverstoke Park in Hampshire, an organic growing estate producing fruit vegetables and herbs as well as meat and dairy and he is in the process of converting his 2,500 acres to biodynamic status.
Dr Michelle Hale, a microbiologist at Laverstoke Park’s recently set up Soil Foodweb Laboratory - the only licensed laboratory of its kind in Europe - will also speak about soil and compost as living ecosystems and the importance of the soil foodweb for nutrient supply and disease control during the main conference programme.
The laboratory assesses the health of the soil foodweb and makes recommendations for the use of compost and compost teas, to ensure that nutrient cycling occurs at the optimum rates and produces the right forms of nutrients for the plant.
