Carrot grower Glassford Hammond Farming is Produce World’s Grower of the Year for 2016. Andy Hammond and Phil Lilley from Glassford Hammond received their certificate from Produce World’s Procurement Director Paul Tracey during a visit to one of the company’s farms.
Andy Hammond, Paul Tracey and Phil Lilley
Paul said: “Growing is at the heart of what we do at Produce World and, as growers ourselves, we understand the challenges and appreciate the skill and hard work that goes into growing great produce year after year. As well as our ‘Grower of the Year’, we also awarded titles for ‘Collaborative Grower of the Year’ and ‘Innovative Grower of the Year’, reflecting two critical aspects of successful modern vegetable growing.
“We asked our Procurement Team to score their growers against a number of criteria and Glassford Hammond Farming scored high right across the board. Last year they gave a great, all-round performance growing conventional roots for us, and are always collaborative in the way they work. 2015 was a challenging year on roots, and Glassford Hammond Farming helped us out when we needed them to go the extra mile.”
Andy Hammond said: “We were surprised and delighted to receive this award. I think it is an acknowledgement of what we try to do every day of the week in terms of collaborating, innovating and working to deliver a high quality product that meets the needs of Produce World, their customers, and, ultimately, the consumers. It is also recognition of the continual effort and hard work put in by all the members of our team, without whom none of our achievements would be possible.”
For the overall ‘Grower of the Year’ category, onion grower James Martin from Martin and Sons at Wisbech was Highly Commended. Produce World’s Head of Procurement, Paul Tracey said: “James delivers consistently high standards of quality year in year out. He demonstrates a great attitude towards ensuring that we are kept compliant and is always willing to help in any way he can. He is a pleasure to work alongside and proves that big is not always best in growing crops.”
Marc Heading and Joe Rolfe
The award for Collaboration went to Marc Heading of A & EG Heading, Chatteris, which is – like Martin and Sons – part of the Greenshoots co-operative. Marc was commended for his collaboration in delivering quality product to Produce World’s customers and his help in storing imported produce.
The Innovation award went to Joe Rolfe, General Manager of Taylorgrown, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Produce World which supplies organic vegetables to the Group and other customers. Joe has been working on a number of cutting-edge initiatives, including biological control of cabbage root fly.
For more information:
Peter Crowe
Tel: 07967 504034