AIC at 20: Leading successful derogation for winter bean seed to secure UK supply
As AIC marks 20 years as the UK agri-supply industry’s leading trade association, we're looking back at some of its greatest achievements since it was founded in 2003.
Each week throughout 2023, we’ll explore a major achievement where AIC represented its Member businesses, promoted the benefits of modern commercial agriculture in the UK, and supported collaboration throughout the food chain.
This week we review how AIC helped secure the supply of winter bean seed to UK farms by successfully applying for a derogation to mitigate supply disruption.
Lower germination
The exceptionally hot and dry conditions throughout the 2022 summer had a negative impact on germination rates, risking a depleted quantity of winter bean seed available for the 2022 drilling campaign.
Working on behalf of Britain’s certified seed sector, the AIC liaised with the industry to gather the evidence and then applied to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) and the devolved governments for a temporary derogation for England, Scotland and Wales.
The derogation was subsequently granted by the Government, allowing for a limited quantity of winter bean seed to be sold with a germination rate of no less than 70%.
The result gave much-needed certainty for British farmers wishing to grow winter beans as a valuable break crop and mitigated the potential for significant disruption to bean seed supply.
Find out more about the certified seed sector by watching the video below.
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Authors
Oli Hill
As Head of Communications, Oli creates and oversees the content published on AIC's website, emails, Member briefings, print publications, and social media. A qualified multimedia journalist, he previously spent six years working at Farmers Weekly magazine as a Senior Reporter on the arable team, and latterly as Community Editor. More recently he was Communications Manager at Red Tractor.
Rose Riby
Rose Riby is Head of Combinable Crops and Seed. Having worked across these sectors for many years, she has a depth and breadth of experience in roles in grain trading, plant breeding and knowledge exchange at AHDB.