Llŷr Jones, 42, who farms at Derwydd, near Corwen in Denbighshire, received the award during the NFU Cymru Clwyd County Conference held at Coleg Cambria Llysfasi on Wednesday 16th February.
The award, now in its third year, was launched by the NFU Cymru Clwyd county branch in memory of their late County Chairman, Dafydd Jones, of Pencoed Ucha, who suddenly passed away in February 2019. The award is presented to the NFU Cymru Clwyd member who has made a great contribution and a lasting, positive impact on agriculture in the county.
Derwydd was traditionally a beef and sheep enterprise, but has now expanded and diversified into a number of areas including egg production, green energy and tourism. The farm extends to 1,600 acres and is varied in terrain. In terms of livestock, the Joneses run a flock of 1,100 sheep and around 250 dairy heifers. In recent years Llŷr has operated a rotational grazing system for his cattle, citing the main benefits for doing so as increased carbon storage, improved soil health and decreased worm burden for his stock.
In 2015, Llŷr developed a 16,000-hen, free-range egg unit on the farm which supplies Tesco on a cost of production contract. This side of the business has now expanded to a second unit, bringing total egg production to 10.5 million eggs a year. Ahead of starting this work, Llŷr conducted research visits at sites across Europe in order to learn how to improve the productivity of the poultry side of the business and limit its environmental impact. The new facilities include ammonia scrubbers to reduce ammonia emissions from the site by an estimated 90%. Egg production has doubled but the investment means ammonia emissions will have reduced. The poultry business does not use any mains water, instead all of the water is harvested from a borehole on the farm.
Llŷr is also the co-owner of Blodyn Aur – the rapeseed oil company selling over 6,000 bottles a month of Welsh rapeseed oil to ASDA, Morrisons and Sainsbury’s in Wales.
The whole site is powered through renewable energy, largely thanks to the 30KW hydro-electric system he installed in 2012 on a stream on the farm, with 24KW photovoltaic panels providing a back-up source of renewable energy when warm weather reduces the flow of water to the hydro system.
Meanwhile an 80KW ground and air source heat pump pumps warm air into the poultry units - a benefit for bird welfare and productivity as the hens use less energy keeping warm. It means that the hens eat less food every day resulting in reduced lorry visits to the site – Llŷr estimates that this has saved around three lorry loads of feed per year.
The solar panels on the hen sheds also power Llŷr’s Polaris Electric ATV and the family has recently purchased an electric vehicle for travel off the farm. Any excess energy generated is exported back to the grid.
NFU Cymru Clwyd County Chairman Dewi Jones said: “Llŷr is an exemplar representative of NFU Cymru, both nationally and on a county level for Clwyd. He is always ready and willing to assist the industry in any way he can, whether that be in meetings as Clwyd’s NFU Cymru Rural Affairs Board delegate, hosting politicians on farm or numerous media interviews.
“Llŷr has consistently been a strong voice for farming who always provides a positive representation of the industry. He is an extremely able communicator and manages to translate farming well to the public, particularly on the proactive work farmers are doing to address climate change and highlighting high standards of animal welfare. Llŷr has given so much to the county, Wales and the wider industry, all whilst raising a young family at home. Speaking on behalf of the judging panel we could not think of a more worthy winner of this award.”
Previous winners of the NFU Cymru Clwyd Dafydd Jones Memorial Award have been Terrig Morgan and Lord Newborough of Rhug Estate.