Update from the Pork Sector Council Chair (November 2025)

In his latest update, Glen Nimmo shares bold plans to further boost the profile of British pork and protect the industry from potential disease outbreaks.

Many in our industry will have returned this week from holidays that are timed to coincide with the schools’ half-term breaks. Some will have used that opportunity to seek out some autumn sunshine in warmer climes. I did so myself.

As the years pass, I find it increasingly attractive to hold back the cold, rain and darkness for just that little bit longer. It inevitably brings a greater longing for the passing of the next few months and thoughts of brighter days next year. This is a decent segue into the key items to bring out from the Pork Sector Council’s recent strategic output.

I noted in my last update to levy payers that the early analysis of AHDB’s new ‘This is British Pork. But not as you know it’ marketing campaign showed that it was performing well and outperforming the previous campaign – which was itself powerful and impactful.

The sector council’s role is to help AHDB get the very best return for levy payers on the money raised by the levy. Where there are successes, it is natural that the sector council will lean into those and extend them where possible and where the impact can be sustained.

We already have clear evidence that marketing has the biggest impact on changing perceptions and stimulating demand when it includes a sustained burst of TV advertising. In recent years, we have doubled the number of TV campaigns in a year to two – running in February and October. At the latest sector council meeting, we considered adding a third campaign in the summer.

The incremental investment is almost £1m. Levy payers can take confidence that the sector council believes this will deliver substantial returns in terms of incremental sales of British pork and volumes of product shifted.

On top of this, there are likely to be material benefits in changing consumer attitudes to British pork, with much smaller gaps between marketing bursts. This builds on the success of campaign activity in 2024, which generated £10 in retail sales for every £1 invested in pork (source: Worldpanel by Numerator, Consumer Media Measure, GB Take Home Panel June 2024).

Our Marketing team had the foresight to commission a summer campaign when shooting the footage for the original advertising materials. This means that we have a fresh and appropriate campaign ready to go with no material additional cost.

Over the last year, the sector council has encouraged the Marketing team to maximise the coordinated efforts of retailers and processors to leverage the impact of our TV advertising campaigns.

It was very pleasing, therefore, to see specific retailer promotions in October hitting the shelves at the same time that our TV advertising aired on screen. This is a tangible benefit of the sector council members helping to facilitate efficient and effective collaboration.

A point I have made several times in my updates over the past 18 months is the need for the sector council to balance its desires to promote growth in the demand for British pork with a clear plan and sufficient resource to protect the fundamentals on which the industry is based.

So, while the sector council strode forward to further marketing activity, it also allocated additional resources to projects designed to keep the enviable reputation our industry has intact.

Total additional investment was c.£250,000 over two years across several projects. The most noteworthy of which is a plan to investigate how compartmentalisation might work in the event of an outbreak of African swine fever, and subsequently to run workshops to prepare processors and producers for its potential introduction if it becomes necessary.

All the people involved in the Pork sector at AHDB – whether it be my fellow sector council members or my colleagues on the executive side – understand that the decisions we make regarding levy investment do not happen in a vacuum.

We are operating in an environment which has multi-dimensional challenges in terms of regulation, geopolitics, animal welfare and consumer preferences. Each of these presents both threats and opportunities to the sector, even if not necessarily in equal measure. In some instances, threats may even turn into opportunities if it further differentiates British pork from its competitors – whether that be in the case of overseas pork production, other meats or non-meat proteins.

As we sit today, price dynamics in international pork markets are likely to intensify the scrutiny of the price premium British pork attracts at both the farmgate and in retail. As a result, the industry will increasingly need more evidence to demonstrate why British pork is a differentiated product worth paying for.

We can be a fundamental plank in the platform that demonstrates the value in choosing British pork.

Our sector council meeting in October also marked the handing over of the AHDB Pork Sector Director baton to Mark Haighton from Angela Christison. It was simultaneously Angela’s last and Mark’s first (as Sector Director) sector council meeting.

I have noted before that I am sad to lose Angela as a colleague. She has been the bedrock of AHDB’s presence in the sector for the last seven years, a time which covered some immensely difficult times for the industry. She has been a fantastic support to me over the last 18 months, and particularly as I reacquainted myself with the sector after a significant absence. All of us on the sector council wish her the very best for what comes next.

I have no doubt, however, that we have a more-than-capable replacement in Mark Haighton. A well-known face across the industry, Mark brings commercial insight and technical expertise to the role. As a sector council member for six years – until early 2024 – he fully understands the respective roles the executive and sector council play in delivering value for levy payers.

Our efforts to make levy payer engagement a fundamental part of how we deliver for the sector will be super-charged by his extensive network of industry participants. I look forward to working with him in the coming months and years.

I will sign off with my traditional refrain. AHDB can only deliver for the sector if it is part of the sector. The more we understand the hopes and concerns of our levy payers, the better placed we are to reflect them in what we do. Our door remains open.