An initiative, backed by the Soil Association network, Innovative Farmers, and coordinated by UK agriculture supply business, Mole Valley Farmers, is exploring the viability of growing lupins locally for organic dairy feed.
“We have six mills, one of which manufactures organic feed for dairy farmers in South West England. We have been producing organic feed for the past 20 years or so and, up to recently, we had been sourcing organic protein including soy, sunflower, sugar beet, and rapeseed from Ukraine.
“But, as is the case for most companies in the UK, that supply has now, more or less, dried up [due to certification issues],” Nigel Mapstone, project lead and ruminant expert, Mole Valley Farmers, told us.
UK organic protein buyers are, in the main, reduced to sourcing soy expeller and sunflower from China.
However, Mole Valley Farmer is not comfortable with that situation. “Firstly, it is quite a distance - the miles travelled do not fit in with the organic food ethos. Secondly, only having one source of protein supply puts us at risk. Furthermore, if there are any queries regarding efficacy of the Chinese protein supply, we will all be really challenged,” explained Mapstone.
There is an increasing trend towards local sourcing, anyhow, in European organic production and associated regulatory proposals, he added.
“So, based on all that, somebody had to start looking at bringing supply closer to home, and getting a little more security in terms of supply. It would be nice, and it is one that we have as target, to be able to produce a feed wholly UK grown.”
Ostensibly, it is a two-year project but Mapstone said: “There is no real end point. It’s a suck it and see how it goes kind of thing.”
Seeds and support
Initially, mixed arable and livestock Mole Valley farming members will test lupins on strips in amongst their own crops to see what results they get. It is in their interest to get involved, said Mapstone. “We supply the seeds and support. They supply the land.”
Due to the link up with Innovative Farmers, the project has a researcher from Reading University attached to it. “That puts a structure onto it, and we are also getting funding from a Duchy of Cornwall scheme linked to Waitrose.”
“But, eventually, we would hope to pass it on to only arable organic farmers to get the tonnage we need.”
He said lupins are quite a robust crop. Moreover, they can be used in dairy rations, with minimal processing, so there would be no need to set up the kind of processing infrastructure linked to soybean cultivation. “I am not an agronomist, but the data we have on the protein specifications of lupins places them pretty much on par with soy. And they don’t suffer so much with pest problems, so they can be grown without pesticides or chemicals,” continued Mapstone.
The main problem in growing lupins organically will be weeds, and the objective of the trial is to find a method of cultivation that can reduce the impact of weeds on yield: “We are going to evaluate growing lupins using wheat or triticale as a weed suppressant. However, we have to see how to avoid cereal contamination and how we would clean that out. We are also exploring the idea of cultivation with peas. As a similar protein source, contamination wouldn’t be an issue.”
To make lupin cultivation viable, yields would have to reach 2.5 tons per hectare, in a price range comparable to current prices for organic soy expeller, which are around £400 to $450 per ton, said Mapstone.