Business development activity

Reaping Rewards

HGCA is committed to helping levy payers improve their productivity and cost management, including resource management, climate change, managing soils and water and market volatility.

To this end, HGCA runs a range of Business Development activities under the Reaping Rewards banner. From Arable Business Groups (ABGs) and Monitor Farms to workshops and conferences, the programme is designed to help farmers reap the rewards of the time and money invested in their arable businesses.

Through meeting with similar growers and expert speakers, the Reaping Rewards initiative is a great way for farmers to protect and enhance their business’s profitability.

HGCA’s Business Development programme across the UK is led by a team of Regional Managers.

Activities

For more information on Business Development activities, contact the Regional Development Team.

Arable Business Groups
HGCA’s Arable Business Group network looks at innovative ways of improving financial performance using CropBench+. Groups meet to find ways of making their businesses more efficient and sustainable.
Arable Monitor Farms
Monitor Farms are normal commercial farms, where the farmer is prepared to allow other farmers access to the farm — and to the decision-making process. The other farmer members can then assess changes made on the monitor farm and are encouraged to adopt successful ideas themselves.
Events
Each year HGCA delivers a range of events covering topics from marketing and price risk management to improving communication between growers and processors.

Strategic area – Business efficiency

Monitor farms

Monitor Farms are normal commercial farms where the farmer is prepared to allow other farmers access to the farm – and to the decision-making process.

CropBench+ is a levy-funded, web-based cost management tool that enables growers to calculate costs of production and gross margins for combinable crops.

An Arable Business Group is a group of growers that want to:

– Improve business management skills
– Understand costs of production
– Investigate pricing strategies
– Share information
– Focus on relevant issues affecting their business
– Make efficient use of industry experts

Each Regional Manager covers one of five HGCA regions and is based at an existing AHDB office. One of the aims of the regional team is to raise and maintain awareness of HGCA in the regions, both with partner organisations but, importantly, with growers themselves. The team is helping HGCA become more regionally focused, better understanding regional needs and targeting information more precisely to the sector.