DairyCo welcomes new board members

The UK’s Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board (AHDB) has announced the appointment of three new members to the DairyCo board. Dairy farmers Chris James and Keith Davis, and Pete Nicholson (pictured), who was selected for his specialist knowledge of the processing industry, will join chairman Tim Bennett and the nine existing board members to develop strategies that determine the direction of the AHDB’s milk division and provide a clear vision for all DairyCo activities that benefit GB dairy farmers, the organisation says.

“I’m pleased to be welcoming them to the DairyCo board. I’m sure that they are going to provide a valuable contribution to the work that we do and I, along with the existing members of the board, look forward to working with them,” notes Bennett.

James farms in partnership with his brother in Pembrokeshire, milking 1,800 cows on four units covering 700ha. Davis, with his brother and family partnership, has a 125 cow herd of 10,000 litre high PLI pedigree Holstein cows that are block calved and milked with robots on a 130 acre farm in Gloucestershire. He also manages Lord Bledisloe’s dairy unit of 600 cows on an intensive grazing system and is involved with a dairy consulting company called Dairyactive. Pete Nicholson currently works for Robert Wiseman Dairies as director of Milk Procurement, a role that he has held since 1998. Nicholson is a past chairman of the Scottish Dairy Federation and the National Dairy Farm Assurance Scheme. He is currently vice chair of Dairy UK Scotland and represents Robert Wiseman Dairies on DEFRA’s Dairy Supply Chain Forum.