Despite the huge hike in agricultural input costs Anglia Farmers is maintaining its level of savings for members.

Latest benchmarking figures based on the worst and best prices into Anglia Farmers throughout 2008 show that savings of between £80-£90 per hectare can be made on an arable farm of 400 hectares. In addition a significant saving of £44 per hectare can be added for members sourcing miscellaneous items such as machinery, cars, healthcare, electricity, insurance, landline and mobile phones.

With a model farm using a typical agronomy mix for East Anglia of winter wheat (160 ha), sugar beet (80 ha), potatoes (80 ha) winter and spring barley (40 ha each), a more pro-active approach to planned purchasing produces an overall saving of just over £79 per hectare or an annual saving of £31,806.

Interestingly, a simpler cropping plan of oilseed rape (133 ha), winter wheat (167 ha) and winter barley (100 ha) shows even greater savings of nearly £90 per hectare or an annual saving of £35,752.

“We constantly benchmark what we are doing,” said Anglia Farmers chief executive Clarke Willis. “This exercise shows that we continue to provide the most effective buying method for our members and helps us to counter claims from people who think they can equal our savings. They may succeed on one or two individual items but overall our performance is unrivalled and the wide range of sundry items we source – perhaps uniquely for an agricultural purchasing group - makes a considerable contribution to overall cost cutting.”