First Milk directors to stand down
Three farmers are to stand down as directors of dairy co-operative First Milk, the company has confirmed.
Tom Campbell will stand down as a farmer director at the company’s AGM this autumn, having served a three-year term as First Milk vice-chairman.
Stranraer milk producer Hugh Parker and Herefordshire dairy farmer Mark James will also stand down at the October meeting.
First Milk said the two farmers had decided that this is the right time to pass on the baton to others, given the strong pipeline of talent coming through from members.
First Milk chairman Bill Mustoe said he was grateful to all three men for giving the company plenty of notice to start recruiting replacements.
“Hugh feels it’s time to give someone else a go after having spent over 10 years as a farmer representative, and Mark wants to spend more time on his successful hospitality business.”
“They will all remain in place until the AGM to allow us to finalise the recruitment process for the new farmer directors, submit the proposed candidates to the Area Representative group for ratification and complete a proper handover process.
Mr Mustoe said First Milk had worked hard since 2010 to ensure it had enough farmers to be on the board of what was a £600m turnover business.
“We’ve worked hard since then to develop not only our area representative group, but we’ve also gone through the process of setting up a development group.”
Set up last summer, the development group numbers 17 producers who meet every month to build their knowledge on all aspects of First Milk as well as the wider dairy industry.
Mr Mustoe said: “It is important to highlight for anyone thinking of putting themselves forward that we have a comprehensive induction process in place for new farmer directors.”
This ensured each new director was quickly brought up to speed on the business and their formal duties as a director and our co-op governance.
“The objective is that we have a smooth and seamless transition,” said Mr Mustoe.
First Milk’s rules and members’ charter allow for any member to put themselves forward for selection, or they can nominate another member.
The deadline for nominations is 30 April 2013.
First Milk currently has 10 board members. There are six farmer directors, two non-executive directors and two executives.
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