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Cawood has tripled the size of its Research business through the acquisition of Innovative Environmental Services (IES) Ltd, a contract research organisation (CRO) based near Basel, Switzerland.

IES is an independent GLP-certified CRO specialising in environmental fate, animal and crop metabolism, aquatic and terrestrial ecotoxicology, and analytical chemistry testing. Its services support the development, registration, and stewardship of pharmaceuticals, agrochemicals, biocides, and chemical products.

‘This acquisition is another important step towards our vision of becoming the global partner of choice for value-added analytical testing, monitoring, research and insight,’ said Simon Parrington, Group Chief Executive Officer of Cawood. ‘With the recent addition of i2L Research and now IES Ltd alongside our existing Mambo-Tox business, our Research business unit is able to meet a wider proportion of our customers’ needs for regulatory studies and contract research.’

The addition of IES Ltd triples the size of Cawood’s Research business unit. The additional capabilities and capacity for safety testing complement the unit’s existing efficacy and safety testing services. The group’s expansion into six countries opens up larger European, Asian, and American markets. Customers worldwide will now be able to source the vast majority of their contract research requirements from Cawood.

‘Our business has expanded quickly in recent years, and we are excited to be joining the Cawood group for its support and backing as we continue to grow,’ said Dr Stefan Höger, Chief Executive Officer of IES Ltd. ‘Our aim is to provide premium contract research on time, tailored to our customers’ needs and with exceptional operational excellence. I am confident that our aligned culture, values and vision for the future, as well as our complementary services, make this an ideal and prosperous partnership.’

‘IES has an excellent international reputation combined with a premium service offering, and wider market reach,’ continued Simon. ‘In line with customer requirements, part of our strategy for 2021 is to continue expanding our research capacity. As our third acquisition of the year, IES Ltd has enabled us to do just that.’
Find out more about IES here.

Sci-Tech is the first UK laboratory to link with online egg and poultry data and management software provider Eggbase to give farmers direct access to and management of their analysis reports.

Until now, farmers have had to upload their analysis results into the Eggbase database themselves after receiving their certificates. This new partnership means that Sci-Tech will automatically upload the reports, sorted into the relevant section for accurate organisation, easy access, and straightforward navigation.

‘I’m really pleased with this new service from Sci-Tech,’ said Richard Robinson, poultry farmer from Ellers Farm in North Yorkshire. ‘The new automatic report upload function onto the Eggbase portal is a real help and saves me a lot of time, particularly with the day-to-day farm administration.’

Eggbase allows pullet rearers, producers, packers, feed suppliers, vets and researchers to remotely and securely record, monitor, benchmark and analyse data to help maximise performance and financial returns. Designed by poultry experts, the cloud-based software allows customers to evaluate performance and identify trends with ease, as well as customise Eggbase to specific requirements.

‘Sci-Tech’s partnership with Eggbase fits perfectly with our strategy of providing expert value-added services to make life as easy as possible for our customers,’ said Simon Parrington, Group Chief Executive Officer at Cawood. ‘This new feature is another example of how we are increasingly using digital services to help our customers unlock the value of their data with real-time analytics, remote management capability, and round-the-clock access.’

‘It has been a pleasure to work in partnership with Sci-Tech,’ said Anne Fleck, Managing Director of Eggbase Ltd. ‘Their strategic vision sits comfortably alongside Eggbase’s commitment to promoting the value of data to improve productivity, improve animal health and support business growth. For egg and poultry farmers, this new service will certainly unlock the power of data, entail less effort to securely receive and store salmonella certificates and water test results, and allow them to create a digital archive to easily demonstrate compliance during audits.’

Sci-Tech’s UKAS accredited testing services linked to Eggbase include:

Click here to learn more about Sci-Tech’s testing services to the poultry, pig and ruminant sectors.

Visit Eggbase’s website here.

Cawood is sponsoring the Farmers Weekly Transition project, an initiative designed to help farmers shift to sustainable farming practices.

Aimed at securing a sustainable future for agriculture and farming businesses throughout the UK, Farmers Weekly have launched a podcast examining environmentally-friendly and sustainable farming methods and how to remain successful. A series of expert webinars and regular news roundups including Transition Specials are also available to help farmers stay up-to-date with the latest news and take advantage of the knowledge that has been pooled together by the industry.

‘At Cawood, we help our customers thrive,’ said Simon Parrington, Group CEO of Cawood. ‘In agriculture, we are in a unique position to protect the environment and even help it prosper by adopting sustainable farming practices and sequestering carbon. Farmers Weekly is doing a fantastic job in helping farmers learn how to do this properly while supporting their own businesses. We are proud to be a sponsor, not just to benefit the agricultural industry but to play our part in supporting a safer, healthier planet.”

The series of webinars, called The Transition Summit, is being run throughout the next few months to answer as many questions as possible. Topics include how to start the sustainable farming journey, the road to net zero, how to benefit from biodiversity, and how to remain productive and successful.

Not only will these resources help farming businesses stay resilient in an ever-changing climate and evolving consumer expectations, but they will also help protect the environment through improving biodiversity, maintaining air and water quality, and storing carbon.

The next session is on Thursday 18th November. For more information on the project or to view all sessions, visit their website.

 

Cawood is sponsoring the Mixed Farmer of the Year award at the Farmers Weekly Awards 2021.

The awards, taking place on Thursday 7th October in London, are the biggest and most prestigious in UK farming. Celebrating and recognising innovation and hard work in agriculture, the very best of British farming is showcased with a variety of categories, including Arable Farmer, Environmental Champion, Farm Innovator, Lifetime Achievement, and Farmer of the Year.

‘We are delighted to be sponsoring the Mixed Farmer of the Year award,’ said Simon Parrington, Cawood Group CEO. ‘At Cawood, we have three divisions that serve UK farming: NRM tests soils, nutrients, plant tissue and grain; Sciantec tests animal feeds and pet foods; and Sci-Tech supports animal health. Each division helps us support agriculture by providing arable and livestock farmers with the analytical data they need to help them measure progress and improve performance. Our mission is to support sustainable food production and a safer healthier planet, which is something mixed farmers play a large part in, so we are very happy to be involved in highlighting their achievements.’

Winners of the Mixed Farmer of the Year award exemplify quality, profitability, and productivity in each of their sectors. Emphasis is also placed on how well their two or more complementary operations work together to create one sustainable farming business. Diversifying to expand service offerings whilst maintaining standards and a stable business structure is resourceful and enterprising in the ever-changing world of agriculture.

‘We are looking forward to attending the awards ceremony in October. It will be great to see the finalists and other customers and colleagues again after such a long time,’ continued Simon. ‘We are proud to support the agricultural industry and the achievements of farmers and their advisors across the country.’

Cawood has acquired the agrochemical and household pesticide testing and development centre, i2L Research Ltd, including its divisions in Spain, the US and the Czech Republic.

‘i2L Research is an ideal strategic fit with Cawood,’ said Simon Parrington, Cawood’s Group CEO. ‘Our vision is to become the global partner of choice for value added analytical testing, monitoring and insight. This extension to our geographical spread and testing capability will enable us to meet a wider proportion of our customers’ needs for regulatory studies.’

i2L will sit in Cawood’s Science business unit, alongside Mambo-Tox, the Southampton-based terrestrial ecotoxicology research facility. Both businesses operate to GLP standards, with Mambo-Tox testing for toxicity of plant protection products and biocides, whilst i2L Research tests for efficacy. The addition of i2L Research’s five locations in Cardiff, Newcastle, the Czech Republic, Spain, and Baltimore, USA, will open up larger European and American markets, allowing customers worldwide to source the vast majority of their contract research requirements from Cawood.

‘We are excited to be joining Cawood and are looking forward to working with Simon and the team to drive the future of our company,’ said Dr Peter McEwen, Chief Executive Officer of i2L Research. ‘Our business has grown quickly in recent years, and the backing of Cawood puts us in a strong position to continue that growth. Both companies are aligned in terms of our vision for the future and our culture and values. This, along with our complementary services, made Cawood an obvious partner for us.’

Simon concluded, ‘We are delighted to welcome Peter, Catherine, Pavel, Roger, Edwin and their teams to Cawood. i2L Research has an excellent reputation and I am sure our customers will benefit from the additional capability this acquisition brings to the Group.’

This is the second acquisition of 2021 for the Cawood Group, following the recent purchase of The Environmental Laboratory Ltd from Sigma-HSE Ltd. The Group was formed in 2006 and has grown rapidly through its strong relationships with customers, its ongoing investment in people and equipment, and the acquisition of businesses that complement or expand its services.

 

About i2L

i2L Research Ltd, established in 1994, is a leading product testing and development centre for the agrochemical, household pesticide and animal health industries. With decades of experience in efficacy testing, its offerings for the UK, EU, USA and worldwide markets range from initial concept testing and screening to complete dossier/submission registration data for plant protection and biocides/professional pest control products. i2L is Good Experimental Practice (GEP) studies certificated for plant protection product registration studies, as well as Good Laboratory Practice (GLP) certificated for efficacy and ecotoxicology studies.

i2L’s services include:

Enitial has been awarded a £250,000 project as part of the UK Environment Agency’s aim to improve environmental outcomes by 2025.

Through its AMP7 Water Industry National Environment Programme (WINEP), the Environment Agency’s ambitious measures will help tackle some of the biggest challenges facing the water environment, from low flows to the effects of chemical and nutrient pollution and the spread of invasive species.

‘This project has been key to the expansion of our service,’ said Leo Phillips, Head of Client Services at Enitial. ‘Adding value to our customers is a core focus of Cawood. With this package, we have been able to add new services and make improvements to existing services, including river catchment, reservoir, and final effluent sampling, plus we have given the whole team up-to-date power boat and water entry training.’

Their ISO 17025 accreditation for collecting samples out in the field, along with their new and enhanced services, means Enitial is fully equipped to unite with water utility providers and regulators to improve waterways and increase biodiversity.

‘Digitisation is also at the forefront of Cawood’s strategy,’ added Leo. ‘In a COVID-19 world of limited travel, the need for remote management capabilities has grown significantly. We are the only company in the UK with our own in-house app, EniCIP, which is tied to our ISO 17025 accreditation. Used for generating field and sampling reports with full GPS and temporal traceability, EniCIP provides a more robust, dependable service offering.’

WINEP outlines a set of actions that all 20 water companies operating in England must complete by 2025 to meet their environmental obligations. WINEP is the largest ever national environmental enhancement programme, which aims to:

 

For more information on our water monitoring/sampling services, please contact us.

Cawood has acquired the specialist contaminated soil and water testing facility The Environmental Laboratory Ltd (ELAB) from Sigma-HSE Ltd.

The new acquisition complements the activities of two of Cawood’s business units: Infrastructure and Environment, sitting alongside recent acquisitions Marchwood (2020) and Enitial (2018). The addition of ELAB supports the air, emissions and waste testing capability of Marchwood with contaminated soil and groundwater analysis, whilst its team will extend the capacity of Enitial’s existing specialist sampling, monitoring and control service.

‘I am delighted to welcome Mike Varley, the ELAB Management team and colleagues to Cawood,’ said Simon Parrington, Cawood’s Group CEO. ‘ELAB has an excellent reputation for expertise in the chemical analysis of contaminated land and water, which fits perfectly with our strategy of extending our environmental services to meet customer needs. We are also seeing an increase in demand for on-site monitoring, so the addition of further specialist teams will enable us to continue to serve this growing market.’

Located in St Leonards-on-Sea, East Sussex, ELAB employs 28 people, including Chartered Chemists, Analysts and Laboratory Technicians. The business will operate as a division of Cawood.

‘We are delighted to be joining Cawood,’ said Mike, General Manager of ELAB. ‘From the first time I spoke with Simon it was clear that we have a similar approach to customers and colleagues. We are looking forward to fast tracking our business growth with access to the Cawood Group customer base and their existing demand for our services.’

Simon concluded, ‘Cawood chooses its acquisitions very carefully to ensure that we maintain the values of the business and our reputation for quality. ELAB fits our business well, in terms of both philosophy and expertise, and we are looking forward to working together to grow our environmental and infrastructure business.’

About ELAB

The Environmental Laboratory Ltd (ELAB), established in 2003, specialises in the testing of soil, water and leachate samples for the construction and infrastructure sectors, and provides on-site environmental monitoring services and equipment hire. With over 35 years of experience in the chemical analysis of contaminated land and water, ELAB is fully UKAS accredited for asbestos identification and quantification and for a range of soil and water tests, as well as MCERTS accredited for a range of soil tests.

ELAB’s services include:

 

For more information, visit ELAB’s website here.

Enitial has partnered with LORENTZ, a specialist German solar powered pump manufacturer, to develop solar powered pumping systems that reduce customers’ costs, downtime and carbon footprint.

In a post-COVID world of limited travel and high environmental awareness as the government pledge for the UK to become net zero by 2050, demand has grown significantly for remote access and operation of equipment. Enitial has pioneered the use of solar powered pumps for landfill leachate extraction in the UK, taking Cawood closer to achieving our aims of sustainable working and net zero carbon practices, including reduced planned preventative maintenance.

“Traditional leachate and groundwater pumping systems are renowned for their expense and the requirement for ongoing maintenance,” said Leo Phillips, Head of Client Services at Enitial. “We have developed a complete solution to help customers reduce their operating and service costs as well as significantly reducing downtime.”

This solar powered solution offers a reliable way to manage leachate levels in a high efficiency system without electrical connections or airlines, helping customers to keep within compliance levels easily. Using the cloud-based pumpMANAGER system to manage and control the pump system via the app or web portal means that customers can monitor and diagnose any faults remotely, thereby reducing operating and service costs. This provides:

‘Demand has surged in recent months as customers have been searching for remotely accessible, sustainable systems; it’s unprecedented,’ continued Leo. ‘Our specialist installation teams can adapt the pumps to suit any situation and integrate into existing systems to optimise our client’s leachate extraction.’

The pump technology is based on over 25 years development experience, resulting in highly efficient, intelligent pumping systems which remove many of the service challenges of both air pumps and non-specialised electric submersibles.

Enitial’s complete solution provides all the hardware and software needed to control, monitor and manage pumping operations. To find out how you can save money and time, contact us.

Marchwood has added further metal and arsenic analyses to its extensive list of accredited services. These tests, including the analysis of metals on Workplace Atmosphere Filters and Polyurethane Foams (PUFs) and Arsenic on charcoal tubes, take Marchwood another step closer to its goal of having full accreditation across the broadest range of analysis.

‘Ensuring our services are UKAS accredited is absolutely necessary in establishing trust with our customers,’ said Jenny Wraith, Business Development Manager for Marchwood. ‘As the only accreditation body recognised by the UK government to assess laboratory standards against internationally recognised specifications, a UKAS accreditation provides our customers with peace of mind for a job well done, as well as demonstrating our extensive capabilities and expertise.’

Marchwood’s analysis of metals on Workplace Atmosphere Filters and PUFs identifies the substances being caught by the filters. Typically found in factory or welding environments, complex airborne mixtures of metal fumes, particulates and gases can be generated, causing adverse health problems if not examined and treated. Arsenic monitoring and analysis on activated charcoal tubes are undertaken on landfill sites to levels set by the Environmental Agency for full compliance.

‘There has definitely been an increase in requests for fully accredited metal analysis at Marchwood,’ continued Jenny. ‘We spend up to 90% of our time indoors, particularly in the colder months, and concentrations of some pollutants can be two to five times higher than outside concentrations. It’s worth businesses investing in our tests, particularly with awareness of occupational hygiene at an all-time high due to COVID-19.’

Health effects associated with air pollutants include:

For more details on how our comprehensive air quality services can help your business, contact us.

NRM has launched a new CarbonCheck service for farmers and their advisors across the UK. Growers and land managers will be able to measure, monitor and benchmark the carbon levels in their soils, enabling them to accurately assess progress on their carbon journey.

Interest in soil carbon storage and sequestration is set to increase over the coming months. The government has committed to a reduction in carbon emissions to net zero by 2050 and the agricultural industry is in a unique position to be part of the solution. Land acts as a huge carbon sink, with soil holding up to three times more carbon than the atmosphere.

Our Chairman, Lord Don Curry, believes farmers will be required to understand the carbon storage capacity of their fields in future. He said, “The ability to accurately measure and monitor soil carbon will be essential for any future income scheme relying on carbon sequestration. Even now, farmers who are committed to sustainable farming practices should be measuring the impact of their activities and regular CarbonCheck testing will allow them to do that.”

The CarbonCheck service was developed following consultation with industry experts, agronomists and government advisors. It combines results from a number of different analyses to present carbon stock and organic carbon in tonnes per hectare. The comprehensive CarbonCheck report is straightforward to interpret and includes a full range of soil tests, including organic matter, C:N ratio, total nitrogen, total carbon, inorganic carbon, carbonate classification and bulk density. There is also an add-on option for Active Carbon for growers working to improve soil health. This test measures the readily available portion of soil carbon that provides a food source for soil microbes and which is therefore considered a key soil health indicator. Regular measurement of active carbon will highlight the impact of different soil management techniques quickly and easily.

Rory Geldard, business development manager for NRM, is seeing more attention being paid to carbon measurement recently. He said, “We work with the majority of agronomy and farm consultancy providers and there has been a lot of interest in this type of analysis over the last few months. The new Environmental Land Management scheme is being rolled out now and farmers are already looking at how the measurement of carbon can help demonstrate the improvements being made by changes in farming practices. We are recommending that growers benchmark their fields now and then repeat the tests annually to monitor progress.”

NRM’s CarbonCheck service has been shortlisted as a finalist for the Royal Innovation Award 2021 and is the first comprehensive carbon monitoring service available to growers in the UK.

For more details on how CarbonCheck can help you benchmark and monitor carbon sequestration, contact Rory Geldard.