Two dairy farming couples from the South West have recently returned from a study tour in the Netherlands following their success in the 2018 ForFarmers Excellence in Farming Awards.

Graham and Kate Bradley from Hallworthy in north Cornwall were announced as winners of the Youngstock Producer category in last year’s ForFarmers awards and were joined on a three-day study tour to the Netherlands in June by Wiltshire based farmers Richard and Claire Sainsbury, who won the Forage Manager category of last year’s awards.

As winners in their categories in the Excellence in Farming Awards, the two sets of farmers were presented with a bespoke three-day study trip across the Netherlands organised by ForFarmers, focusing on maximising efficient milk production from high quality forage.

As well as enjoying a brief tour of Amsterdam, the award winners were taken to visit ForFarmers’ headquarters in Lochem, Nutreco’s Ruminant and Calf Research Centre and an award-winning Dutch dairy farm, robotically milking 130 dairy cows on 190 acres of land and producing 12,000 litres of milk per cow, each year.

On their final day, the study group were given a unique tour the ForFarmers Forage Innovation Field, which is a large-scale demonstration area growing a wide range of forage varieties, as well as testing different management techniques and trialling fertiliser applications.