Future of Organic Beef Put under The Spotlight
U.K - The future of the British organic beef market will be discussed today at the Soil Association’s Organic beef conference which is being held together with the Eastbrook Farm, Graig Farm Producers and the Organic Livestock Marketing Co-operative (OLMC).
20 March 2007
2 minute read
The event aims to discuss key themes from the Red Meat Industry Forum (RMIF)/Soil Association ‘The UK Market for Organic Beef’ report which showed that demand for organic beef is growing rapidly and supermarkets cannot source enough British produced organic beef to meet consumers needs.
The conference, led by Helen Browning, food and farming director of the Soil Association, will include ideas on increasing sales through the supermarkets (which accounts for 63% of total organic beef purchases), identifying new marketing channels, providing what the consumer wants and making better use of resources to increase profitability.
Speakers at the event, which is taking place at Stareton Hall, Stoneleigh, Warwickshire, will include Bob Bansback, director of the RMIF, Huw Bowles, finance and operations director at Organic Milk Suppliers Co-operative (OMSCo), Simon Tomlinson, chairman of the OLMC and Karen Schenstrom, fresh food manager at Sainsbury’s.
A Soil Association spokesman said: “The public increasingly expects the organic beef they buy in supermarkets to be British.
“At the same time the English Organic Action Plan aims to increase supermarket reliance on UK production and has identified beef as one of the ‘staple products’ which could and should be produced here.”
Browning said the conference had come at a crucial time for UK organic beef production, particularly with the significant changes taking place in the beef sector following the modifications to the farm support system.
