A west Norfolk farmer with "an ability to make bold, radical changes" has won the Farmer of the Year title in a national awards scheme.
Mark Means, of JS Means at Terrington St Clement, near King's Lynn, was presented with the top prize at the 2024 Farmers Weekly Awards.
He was praised for his "strong vision" in building a successful root cropping and arable business, where he has tackled potato storage energy use, refocused on potato quality, and improved soil health by reducing cultivations and minimising soil compaction.
The awards judges said: "Mark has an excellent technical knowledge of potato growing and storage. He has embraced renewables and is an early adopter of technology.
"Crops looked excellent and he is growing potatoes without any compaction in the challenging silt soils."
Awards judges said he has made "radical changes" to turn around a loss-making potato enterprise, including cutting the planted area to 100ha and focusing more on quality to secure better prices from retailers.
And they added it was "remarkable" that top-performing potato and sugar beet crops are being grown without compromising soil health.
The silt-rich soils at Terrington are prone to compaction, but this has been minimised by using controlled traffic farming and low-pressure tractor tyres.
And the farm has mitigated the impact of growing potatoes by "getting the biology right" and adding plenty of organic matter, from muck and sewage sludge.
Environmentally, Mr Means was described as a "firm believer in land sparing", maximising production from productive areas leaving room for wildlife, with about 5pc of the farm's area dedicated to nature.
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