Why organic is important

An Ask the Expert feature with Uncle Ted's Organics

“The organic movement has changed society's thinking about the food chain”
-Ted Dickin

What is absolutely certain, is that the organic movement has changed our societies thinking about the food chain and that human health could partly depend on the care we take of animals, crops and the environment.

UT Organics Ltd (UTO)
Long before these issues became so relevant, UT Organics Ltd, under Ted Dickin, were working with farmers and vets on understanding how livestock health could be improved naturally. Poultry was of particular focus.

Poultry healthcare
Ted worked on improving bird health and performance, initially identifying metabolic indicators such as vitamin and mineral status, later supported by many on-farm trials and millions of chick samples. The following ranges are now sold:

Orgamin, a mineral supplement has been used to replace meat and bone meal (post BSE), with remarkable results. Tests on 7.5 million chicks have shown a reduction in FCR from 1.845 to 1.755 and mortality from 5.35 to 3.7%. Gross margin gained 18.4%. Similar work on breeders improved hen performance by an extra 8.6 chicks.

Herban,a digestive enhancer based on herb extracts, was trialled on a paired comparison of two groups of ,000 young turkeys. At 13 weeks, the trial group produced a 55% reduction in mortality and 15% gain in growth.

Plant healthcare
As with livestock, experts recognise that, stress, dietary imbalance and a weakened immune system, all expose plants to pest and microbial challenge. A new plant health improvement range, based on calcified seaweed extract, which restores vigour without chemically damaging the environment, will extend the UTO catalogue this summer. Typical results on maize trials at two separate farms gave respectively plus 16 percent and 13% yield improvements per hectare.

Environmental care
Finally the UTO team are actively developing an ecological cleaning range, based on Organic ingredients. The ‘Envirocyte’ Cleaning and Sanitising products based on natural plant extract bioflavonoids, have application to the agri-food sector, which is still very heavily dependent on chemical based disinfection. These will be kinder to the environment and to people. They are both anti microbial and non-biocumulative. They are stable, easy to use and should be available this autumn, once trials involving DEFRA and CCFRA have been concluded. They comply with the EU Biocide Products Directive and are attracting interest from leading retailers.

Typical microbiological results (at 2% conc. for five minutes contact time):

For listeria monocyt. (challenged at 3.0 x log eight) gave a 7.0 log kill. Similarly, for salmonella typhi. a 7.1 log kill, aspergillus niger a 6.5 log kill and likewise for cultures of other significant pathogenic and spoilage organisms. These ranges effectively provide a more natural care of the food chain and environment, without the use of chemicals potentially detrimental to human health.

Contact UTO Ltd at uncle.ted@btconnect.com or call +44 (0)1422349118.