OFC Council

MIKE GOODING - CHAIRMAN (Oxfordshire)

Mike was born in Guildford and spent his early years in farming on the chalk of Hampshire. He graduated from Seale Hayne Agricultural College in the late 1980s and has spent his career in agricultural marketing and public relations, with particular involvement in the livestock sector, farmer owed trading businesses and food processing. As Managing Director of FAI Farms Ltd and its sister business – Woodland – he responsible for commercial farming operations based at Wytham in Oxfordshire, along with research and development programmes, and consultancy that focuses on future sustainable agriculture.

VINCENT HEDLEY LEWIS - Honorary Treasurer (Lincolnshire)
Vincent is a director of a number of agribusiness companies involved in the farming, processing and research sectors. He runs a family farm and contracting business in South Lincolnshire and sits on the Board of the CLA and is Chairman of the CLA Game Fair. He is a Chartered Accountant

ANDREW BROWN (Leicestershire)

Andrew Brown is a  Rutland farmer born and bred and his family have been farming in the area for over 300 years. The farm is 60% arable and 40% permanent pasture. He is currently NFU East Midlands Chairman, sits on their communications committee and writes a farming blog for their web site. He has won several local, regional and national awards for his conservation work whilst maintaining a viable and productive commercial farm. He hosts school trips on farm and goes into schools to promote British food and farming. He sits on the Farmers Club Committee, , the Commercial Farmers Group, a director of the Oxford Farming Conference and is a member of the Institute of Agricultural Management, the Worshipful Company of Farmers and has achieved the status of Chartered Environmentalist. Productive farming and good conservation practise go hand in hand on the farm and sharing this with the public is seen as paramount.

DAVID DOUGLAS (Ayrshire)

A native of Ayrshire, graduated from Edinburgh University with a degree in Agriculture. Joined SAC and spent nearly 12 years in Agribusiness consultancy with them in Scotland. Moved to Clydesdale Bank in 1987 and have held various roles involving credit, business development and team leadership. Responsible for driving the bank's Agribusiness expansion strategy in England in the last 10 years and took up the current position of Regional Director and Head of Rural Business in April 2006. Still live in Ayrshire on a small sheep farm, running a small flock of pedigree Lleyn ewes.

JULIAN GAIRDNER (London)
Julian Gairdner is a graduate of Wye College and is currently the Online and Digital Development Editor of Farmers Weekly having previously been a farm business consultant in the 90s. In 2006 he directed Farmers Weekly’s highly successful Local Food is Miles Better campaign and in 2007 became a fellow of the Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures, and Commerce (RSA). During his time as online editor he has won a number of awards including the first ever recipient of the Association of Online Publishers’ Digital Editorial Individual of the Year (2009). Away from work he enjoys spending time with his young family, is writing a musical, plays golf, and holidays in Cornwall.

JOHN GILES (Berkshire)

John Giles is a Divisional Director of Promar International –the agri food value chain consulting subsidiary of Genus plc.  Educated at University College Swansea in the early 1980s, he has been with the company for over 18 years. In this time, he has carried out supply chain analyses, business planning, evaluation and feasibility assignments across a wide range of areas within the agri food sector.  John Giles has also worked extensively throughout the UK and on assignments in some 40 other countries, including other Continental EU markets, Russia, the FSU and Eastern Europe, Brazil, China, India, New Zealand, Australia, the Middle East, Chile, the Caribbean, East and South Africa, Mexico, the US and Canada. This includes work in the dairy, meat, fish, horticultural, cereals, soyabean, rice and processed foods and drink sectors. John Giles has in the past been appointed a Visiting Fellow at the School of Agriculture, Food and the Environment at Cranfield University, and is also Chairman of the Chartered Institute of Marketing’s Food, Drink and Agriculture Group.  He is a Member of the Institute of Agricultural Management – he is a member of the National Council.  He has recently been made an Associate of the Royal Agricultural Society of England. He is also a member of the Agricultural Economics Society.

NICK TAPP (Kent)
Nick now leads the Bidwells Agribusiness Team following a career in agriculture, food marketing, grain trading, renewable energy, agricultural policy and international agricultural investment. In addition Nick Chairs Grain Harvesters Ltd, and sits on the board of Magyar Farming Company, farming in Hungary, Serbia and Ukraine. Nick also sits on the Potato Council; is a Nuffield Farming Scholar (‘Market Opportunities for Liquid Bio-Fuels’); and was a founder Director of the British Association for Bio-Fuels and Oils. Nick has just completed 3 years as Chair of the Kent branch of the CLA, and now sits on the Policy Committee

RICHARD WHITLOCK (Bedfordshire)

Following a long career in agricultural merchanting, Richard now runs his own business advising and representing companies and trade bodies in the arable crop marketing sectors. He is Chairman of the UK post-farmgate grain assurance scheme, TASCC, operated by the Agricultural Industries Confederation (AIC) and is shortly due to take on the role of UK grain representative at the EU grain association COCERAL. In recent years Richard has been involved in the emerging UK biofuels industry and sits on the DfT’s Expert Working Group on Biofuels.