About
Formed in 2010 and uniting over 75 years of farming expertise, Mike Gibson, Bill Faulding and Matt Phillips wanted to create "a one stop shop" for farmers.
A unique farming community was formed through the GFP business model which has continued to go from strength to strength.
The GFP philosophy is that "Quality is remembered long after the price is forgotten."
The GFP story
In July 2010 Gibson & Faulding Ltd, a mobile seed cleaning business, and certified seed merchants Phillips Seeds merged to form GFP (Agriculture) Ltd. The partnership created a unique seed processing facility for clients both locally and nationally.
In addition to the personal investments made by the directors, Handlesbanken in Grimsby allowed the plans to build a static plant at Elsham Wold Industrial Estate to progress from the drawing board to reality. The build was completed in record time days away from the start of the 2010 harvest. The plant offered unrivalled standards of technology to produce seed of the highest quality, complimented by a fleet of mobile seed cleaners which achieved the same standards of excellence on farm.
In 2011 the office staff moved from temporary portacabins into purpose-built offices to cope with the growing demands of the rapidly expanding business. The acquisition of Belmont Seeds, a nationally recognised game cover business followed later that year and in 2012 GFP bought a further two mobile seed cleaners to add to the fleet and develop the customer base North of the Humber.
In 2013 the directors were approached by Frontier Agriculture to discuss a joint venture operation to process seed in the East Midlands. As a result, GFP gained access to Frontiers extensive variety portfolio, technical and trials support and financial resources. The company has gone from strength to strength with continued improvements to site facilities and personnel.
In 2019 following an investment of circa £3,000,000 we acquired an additional site on the industrial estate and spent two years developing a second state of the art seed line plus additional storage sheds with a capacity of 120,000 tonnes. Our mobile fleet has grown to nine seed dressers and two colour sorters. This has taken our facilities to the next level and ensured the service GFP offers its valued customers is second to none.
Certified seed production & sales
Third party cleaning for UK seed breeders & merchants
Farm saved/mobile seed processing on farm
Advice & sales of Agri environment seeds, game cover & energy crop seeds
Commercial grain cleaning for merchants & end users
Clean and pack for export human consumption beans & peas to Europe & the Far East
Warehouse storage & distribution
Some facts about our seed business:
GFP process and sell around 55,000 tonnes of seeds to farmers a year
We are the largest processing facility in the UK of seed on one site
It was one of the biggest investments in cereal seed cleaning equipment seen in the last 2 decades
We are one of the few seed processors in the UK where all the seed we process is optically/colour sorted to avoid ergot and weed contamination
Our dedicated team unites a wealth of agricultural knowledge and experience to ensure customers get exceptional advice, support and service. From field to farm we go the extra mile at GFP.
At GFP we grow a significant amount of the seed we produce and sell ourselves on contract with regular growers, many of whom have been growing seed for us since the inception of GFP. We grow our own crops of both winter and spring cereals, pulses and other species for production and supply from our Elsham facilities. Quality of the seed we sell is paramount, this starts with the multiplication of our seed crop. We pay seed premiums to our growers to ensure crops are looked after, harvested and stored to the best possible standard.
We choose the varieties we contract carefully growing both tried and tested established varieties and new exciting varieties that we select from recommended lists, our own experience, discussions with the plant breeders, industry experts and our customers. Fields are selected with a suitable rotation, source high grade seed from the plant breeders and register all crops with NIAB giving them a unique crop ID number. We monitor and inspect the fields ourselves through the growing season with our own team of licenced crop inspectors.
GFP is licenced by APHA to produce, pack and market seeds, APHA oversees checking of records, premises, crops and samples seed. We have a fully licenced LSTS laboratory on site so monitor and test crops ourselves all the way from the farm store through to certification, packing and labelling.
We are always keen to discuss opportunities for seed production with new growers, be that cereals, pulses or other species.
The GFP demonstration ground is essential to our business. Here samples of new and more established varieties are grown under a normal farmer input regime on soil types and conditions in keeping with our region. If varieties are judged to be suitable for our farmer clients they will appear in our portfolio of varieties for sale. This year we will be including a selection of Belmont game cover and grass leys in the trials including our popular Topcut, Smithfield and Flexisward mixtures.
It is invaluable to use breeders and private trials data along with our own assessments on a daily basis, to have the confidence in new products and know the pros and cons of each variety.
We welcome anyone to visit our site for a tour at anytime of the growing year.