What is your background in the fresh produce industry?

Before joining the PVGA, I spent 25 years in the seed industry, initially as a plant breeder and then in a variety of production, marketing, sales and general management jobs.

I worked in Spain for nine years, the US for four years and even had a short spell in Iran, as well as travelling extensively, so I have had the good fortune to experience a wide range of agricultural and horticultural systems. I took the position of chief executive at the PVGA 14 years ago.

What work does the PVGA undertake on behalf of the vegetable industry?

Our role is to represent, promote and defend the industry. The association was originally formed 40 years ago to provide commercial advice and market information to farmers growing vegetables for freezing and canning - vining peas being the biggest crop. In addition, we provide accounting and administration services to five of the UK’s largest vining pea producer organisations.

Over the years, we have been entrusted with the secretariat of a number of specialist crop associations, including those for leafy salads, onions, asparagus, leeks, brassicas, herbs, summer fruits and turfgrass. Most of these have a research and development remit - to identify priorities for Horticultural Development Company statutory levy-funded R&D. Several have a promotional role. They also serve to share information and spread best practice to their members through conferences, newsletters and benchmarking initiatives. And they represent their sectors on the various issues of the day - legislation, pesticides, labour, etc.

As a mutual society, the PVGA is owned by all the associations and groups to which we provide services. We work very closely with the National Farmers’ Union and key industry bodies such as the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board.

What is the value of a service such as Market Intelligence Services (MIS) to the produce industry, in your opinion?

MIS is a wholly owned subsidiary of PVGA, which grew out of a request from one of the crop associations about 15 years ago to check retail prices in supermarkets.

We now monitor about 1,200 different products in the top 13 multiple chains twice a week for subscribers all around the world. The standard reports cover price, country of origin and promotion mechanics, and we are increasingly dealing with special requests, for example monitoring shelf-space allocation, stock availability, supplier codes, packaging information, receipt collection, and “would I buy it?” surveys.

MIS gives suppliers and category managers an inexpensive and reliable snapshot of what is going on in their particular product range. In these days of tight budgets, it is a way of reducing the amount of executive time that needs to be spent in stores.

What changes have you seen to the industry in recent years?

The biggest change has been the consolidation and globalisation of the industry - fewer and bigger players. It’s not unique to horticulture - we see it in just about every other industrial sector - and without a doubt it will continue.

Consolidation was inevitable - we have ended up with bigger and better companies able to deal with clients such as the supermarkets or the major processors.

To have a meaningful relationship between companies, you need to have a similar scale of operation to your customer. One of the positive things we have seen is producers and suppliers growing by necessity to cope with the demands of their major buyers.

The industry used to be very fragmented, with thousands of growers just doing their own thing. The more the industry consolidates, the more the key players can get together through crop associations to share best practice and market information and work together on important issues.

The key thing is that crop associations bring together people who are competitors. A successful crop association addresses common issues - it doesn’t touch on commercially sensitive information, but comes together on common goals such as legislation and compliance.

What are the biggest challenges facing vegetable growers in the UK today?

Growers will be faced with many issues over the next few decades - climate change, water shortages, pesticide availability, etc. The biggest challenge will be maintaining sufficient profitability to be able to invest for the long term, particularly in R&D.

The role of the various crop associations is to facilitate and help growers on issues such as these. However, to a large extent the companies are thinking for themselves.

What promotional work do you do to boost your sector? Are you planning to increase this in future years?

We need to pull together on promotion, which is crucial. There is always someone who does not want to contribute to the cost of a campaign but then gets the benefit from it. That can make it difficult to get the people who are involved motivated, but we have to make them aware it is worthwhile.

Many of the crop associations have highly successful generic promotion campaigns illustrated by websites such as www.peas.org, www.britishleafysalads.co.uk, www.british-asparagus.co.uk, www.onions.org.uk, www.british-leeks.co.uk, www.britishcarrots.co.uk and www.seasonalberries.co.uk

We have the wind in our sails from an enormous amount of public and government interest in healthy eating, 5 A DAY, food security and provenance. We will continue to encourage growers to support these promotion campaigns - if they don’t promote the product, who will?

Yes Peas! is a classic campaign - with a budget of under £50,000 and three years later, we have generated just over £1 million of coverage. Pea sales have gone up four per cent, which we don’t claim all the credit for - but the campaign has helped.

The Seasonal Berries campaign is now showing the benefits for both British berries and summer fruits supplied out of season, making it a seamless transition.

What’s next for the PVGA?

Our main priority is to continue to provide a valuable service to our members and grasp whatever new opportunities come our way.

We are keen to take on new jobs. One of the challenges we faced was that 14 years ago, membership levies made up 80 per cent of our income. Today, levies account for only 17 per cent of our income because we have built up other income streams. That enables us to retain a strong team of experienced staff.

Our team of 12 has a varied range of skills, and four of us had commercial experience before we started working for the PVGA. Heather Briggs, Tim Mudge, David Butterfield and myself have been around the industry and that enables us to bring a broad range of expertise to the different projects and - hopefully - do our best for our members.

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