OF&G :: The Blog

A bit of fun has been had this week by organic milk cooperative, OMSCo, which has erected a tribute to Stonehenge -  made out of refrigerators painted to look like cows.

It’s a nice stunt to raise the profile of organic milk and give OMSCo a platform to promote its benefits. The move has generated quite a bit of press interest and must surely be a-moo-sing (sorry!) motorists on the A303 at Encie, in Somerset.

Particularly of interest to us though, was the fact that it’s on OF&G licensee Robert Foote’s land and this piece done by the BBC has given Mr Foote a lovely opportunity to spell out what difference being organic has made to his farm and his farming practises.

He points out that the use of natural fertilisers on the land has proved to be far more efficient than artificial alternatives and gives a pretty upbeat assessment of the current organic farming landscape from where he stands.

If you want to see the creation in place you’ll have to get your skates on – it’s only there until September 29.

Okay, must clarify the headline. No-one from here has actually been to the top of Everest. Maybe one or two have conquered The Wrekin or the Long Mynd and our Certification Manager, Steve, spends many a weekend tramping around very tall parts of the country – but I digress.

Sir Ranulph Fiennes conquers Everest with support from Science In Sport products, certified organic by OF&G

What is exciting is, as far as we know, for the first time an OF&G certified product has been to this highest of high places and in the hands of none other than adventurer extraordinaire, Sir Ranulph Feinnes!

Sir Ran sought advice and essential supplies from Science In Sport, which is a leader in sports nutrition, and has chosen OF&G as its certifier for a range of organic products. Among the SIS products Sir Ran took on his successful ascent, in May, were the organic ones (which he’s pictured holding).

This very British hero even went as far as to tell SIS that its energy formulations had “definitely powered me to the top” and he wished he’d had them with him on his previous attempts!

SIS really knows its stuff when it comes to sports nutrition and works with leading names in sport both nationally and internationally, including the heavily Olympic gold-medalled GB sailing and cycling teams, 2009 Tour de France winner, Alberto Contador, last year’s Tour de France winner Carlos Sastre, plus their very successful team mates, as well as leading athletes and teams in a whole cross-section of other sports.

OF&G is very pleased to provide certification services to SIS, who joined us on stand at the Natural and Organic Products Europe show, at Olympia, this year.

We’d like to pass our own congratulations on to Sir Ran for his achievement, which you can read about in more detail here.

OF&G licensee, Martin Orr, and his family are featured in the Sunderland Echo as Sunderland’s first organic farmers.

It must be said we were quite surprised at this apparent statistic, because it’s rare to find anywhere that isn’t represented yet by an organic farm. Out of interest, we checked our database and it certainly doesn’t appear that we have anyone else registered there, though, of course, we only certify a portion of the market (and many people will testify to the fact that trying to get a full list for the UK out of Defra is like, well, something that’s impossible to do!).

The Orr’s have a good business going supplying their organic pork, lamb and beef to a growing band of loyal customers.

We wish them every success!

Just found this great write-up on our National Organic Cereals 09 event from Jimi and Sarah at Launceston Farm.

They’ve had some great coverage themselves in the national press and it’s very satisfying to learn that their long journey to Suffolk had positive benefits for them. They’re not alone – the feedback from the day is still coming in and it’s all extremely up-beat!

It’s that time of year again. Tomorrow is our second annual arable event, National Organic Cereals 2009.

Last year's arable event, in Shrewsbury

Last year was a runaway success and I can exclusively report that this year is…… heading the same way! As well as an array of very knowledgeable and topical speakers we’re looking forward to an important announcement from one of our sponsors. So watch this space.

You never know when you go for it again whether you’ll get the same result, but we are once again oversubscribed and looking forward to a very useful and informative day. The weather report doesn’t look too bad either!

Of course things always move on and this year we’re aiming to keep up a stream of snippets from the day using good old Twitter (follow @ofgorganic) to post updates, comments and even pictures – mobile signals permitting. If you’re into Twitter you’ll probably know what I mean when I say that we’ll try and tag our tweets with #noc09. For everyone else, that means you can search on that term in Twitter and should find all the tweets that contain it, thereby giving you a dedicated stream of updates.

Even if the mobile coverage lets us down, we’ll have plenty of info to follow-up for those who weren’t there, with pictures, video and a round-up of the day as soon as we can get it all online.

If you’re coming along, we look forward to seeing you there.

Organic Farmers & Growers licensee Brian Amos (left) dropped by the OF&G stand for a chat. So delighted was he to be given an OF&G mug – he took one for his wife too!

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