Mr. Jonny Greene:

We were cold that day. I have one fewer tractor on the farm. Perhaps it is not as good but I have one fewer labour unit on my farm. Our diesel bill is much smaller, as is our fertiliser bill. We have almost cut out insecticide, although I will not quite say we have got there. One must be pragmatic every now and then and there will be a year where there might be a very mild November, with aphids proliferating. Sometimes one must react. The idea is to put building blocks in place. We have greatly reduced the amount of insecticide used. Nearly 20% of my winter barley and 40% of winter wheat has no herbicide used on it. We are using natural mulches and competitive species such as the clover I mentioned, to keep an understorey below the wheat.

That stops weeds coming through and because we are not cultivating, we not generating weeds to grow. We are getting less weeds. Each cost we save will amplify into the next stage. A whole pile of little costs are being saved but they are significant and we are starting to see a benefit to the bottom line.