Oxford Farming Conference appoints new directors

Caroline Millar, John Gilliland OBE and Robert Lasseter will all start three-year terms once their positions are ratified at the annual general meeting on January 6 2015.

They will join the OFC council to help deliver the conference programme, speakers and the extended activities now linked to the OFC such as the Summer Arable Conference at the Cereals Event.

Richard Whitlock, chairman of the 2015 OFC, said: “These new directors are all hugely enterprising and motivated farmers and we welcome the drive, skills and contacts that John, Caroline and Robert will bring to the OFC. ​

‘Breadth of experience’​

“We were looking for directors who have passion, competence and a breadth of experience in the agri-food sector – and we certainly have that in these people.” ​

Millar – who was voted the top speaker at the 2014 OFC – farms beef, sheep and arable with her husband in Angus, Scotland where she also runs five-star accommodation for the ‘couples’ market.

Gilliland is a director of agriculture at Devenish Nutrition, a non-executive director of Scotland’s Rural College and a former president of the Ulster Farmers Union. He farms 400 acres of arable land in Northern Ireland.

Lasseter runs a Freedom Food accredited pig unit and arable farm in Dorset, a director of Wessex Grain, a board member of the Home Grown Cereals Authority and a governor of the UK’s first land-based Studio School and of Kingston Maurwood College.

The other directors on the board are: Dr Tina Barsby, Al Brooks, Andrew Brown, Martin Davies, John Giles, Alan Laidlaw, Charlotte Smith and Philip Wilkinson OBE.

The 2015 Oxford Farming Conference will run from January 6–8 2015.