Throughout all our farmed land sustainability and biodiversity are key priorities for us. We look to manage all our soils and watercourses sustainably through good farming practices. These include:

• Direct drilling and reduced tillage where possible to store carbon in our soils and reduce fuel usage
• Applying manures only in fields that require it.
• Establishing grass buffer strips alongside watercourses.

Although potatoes naturally require soil disturbance to grow we are always looking at ways we can mitigate this.

Some of our efforts of growing potatoes sustainably include:

• Cultivating the soil rather than ploughing to reduce carbon loss
• Using organic manures to add organic matter to the soil, improve water retention and reduce artificial impacts.
• Every field is soil sampled prior to planting to accurately apply nutrients through the use of both organic manures and artificial inputs. Every field has an application plan unique to that field to prevent over fertilisation and under fertilisation.
• Establishing cover crops prior to planting to:
  1. Reduce tillage
  2. Build soil organic matter
  3. Control weeds and pests
  4. Improved moisture retention resulting in less irrigation required
  5. Reduced inputs
• Use of soil moisture sensors to improve our irrigation/water efficiency. We can reduce water wastage from percolation through the soil by applying the right amount at the right time and also prevent crops from drought stress through under irrigating.
• Increasing the number of nitrogen applications by targeting little and often to reduce nitrogen leaching through the soil.
• Sending crops at a distance from the farm direct to the factory to reduce fuel usage.

HOW WE IMPROVE OUR SUSTAINABILTY?