Waste not, want not

I am going to be out and about in July, starting next week. A lot of the UK industry will be seeing me at various events and openings around the country, ranging from the Great Taste Awards judging in Dorset, to Wyke Farms in Somerset, to the Great Yorkshire Show in Harrogate. I am sure I’ll feel like Michael Portillo by the end of it, as my preferred mode of transport is by train. I also plan to clock up a few miles driving around the countryside too. All for good cause, methinks.

One of the my stops will be Wyke Farms’ new water recovery plant. In the past few years, I can’t tell you how many of these I’ve seen. Water recovery, anaerobic digestion plants ­ here in the UK, it’s gone from a rarity and something only seen on the Continent, to a regular feature of British farming and dairy processing life. The sight of solar panels on the sides of barns is becoming a more regular feature as well.

What the past few years of boom and bust has taught the industry is that every input is not to be wasted ­ whey is now a valuable offshoot of cheese making, and water recovered from the process helps keep costs down. As councils and the government look to increases the costs for waste disposal, it behooves the sensible dairy processor to look at their waste stream and try to reduce, reuse and recycle.

Sustainability is written into the DNA of every farmer and processor globally. Wastewater treatment is just a part of the eternal quest to make dairy pay, and it also provides environmental kudos for companies. It is a virtuous circle.

See you all on the road!