A major project funded by Defra, the Horticultural Development Company (HDC) and industry will encourage the uptake of responsibly-sourced growing media and reduce the dependence on peat.
The project, ‘Transition to responsibly sourced growing media use within UK horticulture’, is worth £1 million over the next five years.
Set to commence in January 2015, it will focus on easing the acceptance and uptake of a broad range of proprietary, responsibly-sourced growing media by the horticultural industry.
Led by ADAS, Institute of Food Research (IFR), alongside industry experts, growing media companies and horticultural production businesses, the project will encourage a move away from iterative trials towards an innovative predictive model which will target desirable blends at low financial cost.
On-site grower demonstrations and R&D trials will be used to test the model.
“The commencement of this project is urgently needed by the horticulture industry which increasingly requires tried and tested, responsible growing media choices as well as access to information on the most effective and refined blends,” said head of R&D at the HDC, Jon Knight.
“This project will enable a robust set of trials, coupled with a structured flow of knowledge between the research community and industry, which will increase the confidence of commercial growers towards using progressive, innovative refined and of course responsibly sourced growing media.”
The Sustainable Growing Media Taskforce was established to reduce peat use to zero in the horticulture industry by 2030, with voluntary phase out milestones for different sectors.
Its remit was to focus on how barriers to using sustainable growing media or substrate could be overcome, rather than solely considering how to reduce peat use.
No comments yet