By Laura Pickup, Head of Strategic Marketing and Connections
Blink and you’ll have missed it, the 2024 Royal Welsh Agricultural Show has been and gone for another year. This pinnacle event in the farming calendar never disappoints and, though we had a revised stand and overall presence, we certainly weren’t smaller in exposure and engagement. A strategic decision to revise our presence at the show, whilst ensuring maximum value for money for our levy payers, meant cooking demos were held on retailer stands, and a renewed focus was placed on knowledge transfer and industry engagement on our stand. The revamped stand highlighted key areas where HCC is committed to delivering on behalf of levy payers including working towards sustainability, premiumisation and trade success for the Welsh red meat sector as well as horizon scanning and Research & Development. To further extend our presence across the show ground, industry insights were also shared in seminars on stakeholder stands, and we worked in partnership with both processors and retailers to judge competitions and deliver cooking demonstration, bringing consumers even closer to the point of purchase.
As usual, the HCC Breakfast kick-started the activities featuring HCC Chair Catherine Smith and Huw Irranca-Davies MS, Cabinet Secretary for Climate Change and Rural Affairs. A special guest to the event was then First Minister Vaughan Gethin and 100 guests enjoyed a Welsh produce breakfast.
The HCC Scholarship reception saw us introduce our latest scholar, and we wish William Powell every success as he embarks on changing the reputation of the suckler cow. Members of HCC’s exciting new initiative, Meat Minds, were also announced during the week. This new programme will work with young people involved in the red meat sector to stimulate discussion, increase understanding and cultivate connections between different links in the supply chain. Those visiting the stand throughout the show could also find out more about the Arfor project on Decarbonising Welsh Beef, which aims to appraise the impact of varying the age of rearing beef cattle on both economic return and greenhouse gas emissions. Welsh speaking farmers from Ceredigion, Carmarthenshire, Gwynedd and Anglesey are sought for this particular study, with benefits for those involved including free carbon audits and free financial analysis which could lead to increased profits for farming businesses.
HCC also launched the new AberInnovation project which will be evaluating the meat quality of fresh and frozen PGI Welsh Lamb. The project builds on work previously completed by HCC in the Welsh Lamb Meat Quality Project as part of the Red Meat Development Programme, and will inform future supply chain developments and trade activities. Another highlight for us during the week was the joint seminar with the Nature Friendly Farming Network (NFFN), which discussed weatherproof farming with soil health specialist Niels Corfield. Welsh farmers, Rhodri Lloyd-Williams and Aled Picton Evans provided practical tips on how to become more resilient to extreme weather events while increasing profits and maintaining, or even increasing productivity.
Our Consumer Executive, Elwen Roberts worked with Wales YFC to judge one of their cooking competitions, delivered a live cooking demonstration for S4C and put on daily cooking demonstrations in partnership with retailers to celebrate their Welsh Lamb sourcing strategy.
On a final note - we may have looked different, but our ultimate goal was the same. We enjoyed sharing information about our latest marketing activities in the domestic and export markets with levy payers, and were delighted to meet with a number of processors, exporters, retailers and export customers to discuss and plan for upcoming trade developments and marketing support, not only in Wales and the UK, but also in key export markets including Europe and Japan. We will continue to advocate not only for our industry, highlighting its importance and value to the economy, but also our Welsh brands’ taste, health and sustainability credentials.
