Honorary President of LEAF, HRH The Duchess of Edinburgh, pays visit to see sustainable food and farming in action

Our Honorary President, Her Royal Highness The Duchess of Edinburgh, visited Jordans Cereals today for a ‘Farm to Bowl’ tour.

The Jordans Farm Partnership (JFP) is a unique, industry leading collaboration between Jordans Cereals, LEAF Marque and The Wildlife Trusts.

Her Royal Highness visited all aspects of the Jordans business looking at the journey of sustainably grown oats from the field, through the mill, and into the finished cereals. She met with farmers supplying oats to Jordans as part of the partnership, talked with Jordans employees and met with young career entrants and local school children, discussing the many career opportunities available in the agri-food sector – from production and logistics roles to sales, marketing, and sustainability. The Duchess also met with Bill Jordan MBE, co-founder of Jordans cereals, and representatives from a number of industry partners that support LEAF’s work to promote engagement with more sustainable food and farming systems, including Waitrose, Tesco, HSBC, Hutchinsons and Frontier.

LEAF Chairman, Philip Wynn said:

“It has been an immense pleasure to welcome Her Royal Highness to Jordans today to see the Jordans Farm Partnership in action. It is an outstanding example of different sectors working together to achieve shared outcomes for wildlife and biodiversity and pushing forward more regenerative, agroecological farming approaches. It has been a privilege to demonstrate the impact this progressive partnership is making to improve wildlife habitats, species numbers and overall biodiversity of our farmland at a significant scale. Also, to showcase the wide range of exciting career opportunities available to young people across the food and farming sector."

LEAF CEO, David Webster, added: “It is a great honour to host Her Royal Highness at Jordans, given the pioneering efforts this business has made to work with farmers to embed wildlife conservation in its supply chain since 1985. All the farms in the Jordans Farm Partnership are now LEAF Marque Certified, which means that as well as supporting wildlife, these farms are taking action to ensure more productive soils, cleaner water, lower greenhouse gas emissions and community engagement, by supporting school visits, or Open Farm Sunday, for example.”

David concluded: “This visit is a wonderful example of how LEAF is working with progressive farmers, food businesses, supermarkets, banks, environmental charities, schools, and universities to promote the understanding and adoption of more environmentally sustainable farming practices. We are deeply grateful for the enormous support we receive from Her Royal Highness for all our work across the food, farming, and education sectors.”

Jordans’ Managing Director Anne Sawbridge added:

“Caring for nature has always been at the heart of Jordans philosophy and we are proud of what we’ve achieved through the Jordans Farm Partnership. Working with LEAF and the Wildlife Trusts, our oat farmers take a holistic, ‘whole farm’ approach that balances the considerations of nature recovery and sustainable farming practices with those of running a commercially successful farm.

“It has been an honour to introduce LEAF’s Honorary President, HRH The Duchess of Edinburgh, to one of our partnership farms and to the Jordans cereals factory, bringing to life the natural simplicity of our farm to bowl story.”

The Duchess of Edinburgh was accompanied on the tour by The Lord Lieutenant of Bedfordshire, Susan Lousada, High Sheriff, Mr Bhavesh Shah and The Lord Lieutenant of Cambridgeshire, Julie Spence.