An ADOPT-funded project is exploring whether shared fermentation facilities can help growers recover value from surplus crops. PEP is providing project support, market research and evaluation having supported the original funding bid.
A glut of cabbages can represent a successful harvest and a commercial headache at the same time. The vegetables have already required land, labour and resources to grow. But if customers cannot use them while they are fresh, much of that investment may bring little return.
Could a shared local fermentation kitchen help growers turn that surplus into saleable products—and retain more of the value within the local food economy?
That is the question behind the successful OxFarmToFork fermentation bid, supported through ADOPT, part of Defra’s Farming Innovation Programme delivered in partnership with Innovate UK.
The Oxfordshire project will test the practical and commercial requirements of turning suitable surplus and secondary-grade vegetables into longer-life fermented foods. Promoting Economic Pluralism is a project partner, providing support to help the team coordinate the trial, gather evidence and assess whether the approach could work for other growers.
Who is taking part?
The partnership brings together growers, a local food network, fermentation and food-safety specialists, and PEP.
Worthy Earth Limited, led in the project by co-director Harrison Fannon, is the lead applicant. Worthy Earth will contribute vegetables, coordinate practical delivery, manage processing trials and volunteer involvement, and record what happens during production. Its experience supplying local customers, including through OxFarmToFork, grounds the experiment in the realities of commercial growing.
Sandy Lane Farm, represented by Cate Bennett, is the second grower partner. The organic farm in South Oxfordshire will provide suitable vegetables and a further grower perspective. Its farm shop offers a route for testing customer responses to the products, including their appeal and price.
Good Food Oxfordshire brings the wider local food network. Through its OxFarmToFork initiative, it connects growers with institutional buyers, including Oxford colleges. It will support market research, share learning and work with growers to explore how a shared processing facility could operate.
Elena Deminska provides specialist fermentation advice. Drawing on her experience building London Fermentary and The Fermary, she will advise on suitable produce, recipes, equipment, production processes, quality and fermentation monitoring. Christina Delaney, a professional food-safety expert, will support the project’s food-safety compliance.
PEP is providing project support through Henry Leveson-Gower, the ADOPT Project Facilitator. Our role covers coordination, evidence gathering, market research, commercial analysis, evaluation and reporting. We will also support the partnership’s project tracking and risk management, helping turn practical experience into useful guidance for other growers.
Testing the whole model
Fermentation is an established process. The challenge is to find out whether a shared facility can use it in ways that make economic and operational sense for smaller growers.
The project will use commercial kitchen facilities at Blenheim Palace, where Worthy Earth operates their vegetable garden. The plan includes an autumn and winter production phase, followed by a summer glut trial, allowing the team to explore different seasonal supplies.
The project will track which vegetables are suitable, how much preparation and processing they require, what quantities emerge as finished products, and the costs of labour, equipment, packaging and storage. Food-safety planning and controls are central to the trial.
Market testing will use products made during the project. Farm-shop customers, local buyers and institutional catering contacts can then respond to something tangible, helping establish realistic prices, packaging requirements and potential demand.
Volunteer participation will also be examined carefully. The evaluation will compare paid, volunteer-supported and mixed labour arrangements, accounting for training and supervision. This should help distinguish the conditions needed for a viable grower service from those needed for a community-supported facility.
Sharing equipment—and deciding how to share the benefits
A shared kitchen raises questions that extend beyond production.
Would growers prefer to pay for a processing service and sell products under their own names? Would they supply vegetables for a shared product? How should access, costs and responsibilities be organised when harvests fluctuate?
Good Food Oxfordshire will facilitate this work with growers. The operating model is one of the things the project needs to discover, alongside the technical and financial evidence.
This is also where the connection to PEP’s work becomes particularly clear. Skills, relationships, access to infrastructure and the rules governing collaboration all shape the opportunities available to businesses. Bringing those perspectives together can reveal possibilities that a narrow focus on the price of surplus vegetables would miss.
The project’s planned outputs include practical guidance, cost and labour evidence, market findings and options for shared operation. These will help other growers judge whether a similar approach could suit their circumstances.
For PEP, supporting this work means putting economic thinking to a practical test: can collaboration help growers make better use of crops already grown, strengthen their livelihoods and build local capacity to process food?