Being part of the wider Sustainable Food Places network meant we were able to feed into a big House of Lords inquiry this week through our regular meeting.
The House of Lords Select Committee Inquiry on the Future of Horticulture is asking questions about the challenges and opportunities, along with a range of specific questions
At a county level we joined Gloucestershire, Shropshire and others to share what we've found through our activities as an alliance. For us this included:
The time it takes to find land and get it into production
The need for locally appropriate marketing - for us it's different even between market towns and rural connubations
The need - and opportunity - for networking for horticultural producers in the area, in order to pool resources, poll selling power, work in digital hubs (And we heard of a great example in Devon... the Good Food Loop
The need for more links with other areas through communications - we know of great opportunities here for new entrants, but we're not sure enough people know in other parts of the country who might be able to make use of the opportunities in Herefordshire.
This is a tiny shippet of what was shared, we'll feed back more whne shared with us!
There is opportunity to feed in to this enquiry for others, deadline 10th April:
https://committees.parliament.uk/call-for-evidence/3065/
