Ards farmer wins UFU Winter Barley Competition

This year, second place was awarded to Morris Peden of the UFU’s Ballymoney Group, and scooping up a respectable third place was Robert Arnold of the UFU’s Larne Group.

Speaking on behalf of the judges, Gerry Kelly, from BASF, and Mervyn Owens, from Origin NI, have said: “We would like to congratulate all those who made it to the final on the high quality of the crops produced this year. The standard was exceptionally high and all the crops were a credit to the growers involved, especially the winning fields.

“The winning field stood out as being consistent across the board, uniformity was notable with the crop all standing. Attention to detail was clearly evident as weed control was very good and disease control was exceptional by the first, second and third place winners.”

UFU deputy president Victor Chestnutt said: “I would like to extend my congratulations to all finalists, and thank all those who entered this year’s competition. I would also like to thank the competition judges who travelled across Northern Ireland who judged seventeen high quality fields in total.”

The awards for the Winter Barley, Oats, Winter Wheat and Spring Barley cereal competition categories will be officially presented at the 2017 UFU and sponsors Cereals Competition Awards and lunch planned for later this year.