Pfizer Trainee of Year Award

13-11-2008 | Home | News

A highly promising livestock manager on a farm in the UK is the 2008 winners of the Pfizer Trainee of the Year Awards for the poultry industry.

The award, worth more than £2500, was presented by the former Farm Minister Lord Rooker at a ceremony at the House of Commons.

Daniel Bush followed his father in working for Crown Chicken and began looking after chickens just over a year ago. He now manages an 180,000-bird broiler unit at Swainsthorpe, near Norwich. Matthew Ward, agricultural director of Crown Chicken, said they were impressed by how quickly Daniel had learned and taken advice, quoting the example of how he had managed to counter the spiralling cost of heating, halving the use of gas through managing the ventilation according to the chickens’ body heat. “Daniel has improved the results of the site and is now one of our top performing broiler farm managers,” he said.

The award includes a £2,000 training grant and a £500 cash prize, together with an engraved trophy.

Runners-up for the poultry award are Christopher Burton, of Hykeham, Lincoln, relief farm manager working with 25 farms of Moy Park in Lincolnshire — he chose a career in poultry after originally gaining a sports science qualification — and Martin Womack, who manages 92,000 broilers on two sites at Bunwell, Norfolk, for the Harvey family, broiler growers for Banham Poultry.