Menawicket Farm
Alex Stephens runs Menawicket Farm which encompasses 650 acres of arable land, sheep and potatoes near Lostwithiel. He is also a lecturer in crop agronomy and involved with the British Potato Council.
With such a busy lifestyle Alex now finds the Internet invaluable. He first started using the net about 8 years ago but found it frustratingly slow. Now he’s using broadband he doesn’t know how he lived without it.
“I do a huge part of my business on the Internet - it’s a great time saver.”
Alex is involved in the Countryside Stewardship scheme which aims, through the payment of grants, to improve the natural beauty and diversity of the countryside. It involves a lot of mapping and measuring fields for which he uses a mapping application provided on the DEFRA website. The application also allows him to see where other schemes are running.
“I use broadband all the time to look up information on the DEFRA website and am using it more and more to download forms.”
As part of his involvement with the British Potato Council, Alex regularly accesses their website which contains all sorts of information for both consumers and growers.
“The British Potato Council always send large documents through. With broadband it’s much quicker to download them.”
Alex also uses the Internet for research for his training courses. He teaches Basis courses like FACTS for fertiliser advice and Basis for agronomists using broadband both to prepare lessons and keep in touch with his students.
