Article taken from Agronomist & Arable Farmer, March 2017
Agrovista has strengthened its national fruit agronomy team with two new appointments, covering the West Midlands and South of England.
Herefordshire-based David Taylor will service top and soft fruit customers, mainly in the west Midlands, but also nationally as demand for Agrovista's service builds.
He started in the fruit sector in 2001 with Withers Fruit Farm, Ledbury, where he spent seven years, ending up as general manager. He then worked as grower manager for S&A Produce in Herefordshire for four years, followed by a spell as a Berry Gardens agronomist.
Taylor said: ""While there are some interesting challenges ahead, not least those stemming from Brexit, I believe that the UK fruit industry has a very bright future.
""I really like Agrovista's approach to delivering results for its customers, which gives me plenty of scope to set and achieve my own goals and directions while achieving the best results for my clients.""
New colleague Simon Warren will cover the South of the UK from his base in Kent. He spent his career in the soft fruit sector and spent 12 years at Kent-based Edward Vinson Plants as a propagation manager, before four years as growing manager at S&A Produce. He will move into top fruit and stone fruit at Agrovista.
Warren said: ""I enjoy the agronomy side of growing, as well as the challenge of growing a good, healthy crop, maximising crop quality and yield with minimum waste.
""I am looking forward to improving my knowledge in these sectors and working within the team to achieve this.""
Mark Davies, commercial head of fruit at Agrovista, added: ""Both Simon and David have a wealth of soft fruit experience. They will focus on building support in the use of our range of bees and biological control products in the field, while developing their knowledge of tree fruit crops.""