A TREGARON farmer has been announced as the winner of this year’s NFU Cymru / Wynnstay Sustainable Agriculture Award.

This year’s award was launched at the ‘NFU Cymru Sustainable Agriculture: Food, Farming and the Environment’ conference in June.

During a presentation at the NFU Cymru conference earlier this month, Aled Lewis from Penbont, Tregaron, was presented with a prize of £500 and a Welsh slate engraved barometer.

Aled farms in partnership with his brother with the core business milking 150 dairy cows in an all-year round calving system. Aled invested which is integrated into a grazing system with cows coming in to be milked when they finish grazing.

As well as embracing technological advances with the robotic milking system, the first diversification into renewable energy took place in 2011 with ground source heating to Aled’s parent’s house. Since then, they have installed 4kw of roof mounted solar panels and a 185kw biomass boiler. The farm now houses four combined heat and power units which produces 40kw of electricity per unit when at full capacity.

Aled has been committed to Glastir schemes since 2013 and is also managing significant areas of SSSI land on Cors Caron in conjunction with NRW. He also manages areas of woodland hedgerows.

On the farm, Aled has created a pond which is habitat for water voles and various amphibian mammals. The pond has also been an invaluable water resource for the livestock on the farm during the recent hot weather.

Off farm, Aled has been a retained firefighter at Tregaron Fire Station for the last 30 years and has been Watch Manager for the last eight years, in charge of a crew of 12 firefighters. He also volunteered as the local co-ordinator for his local area during the coronavirus pandemic.

He hosted several agricultural students from Plouvien, Brittany as part of twinning activities between the French town and Tregaron, and more recently, Aled hosted the 2022 Tregaron National Eisteddfod. He is a former Chair of the Ceredigion NFU Cymru County Branch.

Hedd Pugh, NFU Cymru Rural Affairs Board Chairman, one of the judges for the award, said: “I’d like to congratulate Aled on winning this award. The use of technology mixed with the dedication he shows to producing high quality milk whilst maintaining, protecting and enhancing the environment makes him a fantastic example of how productive, efficient food production, environmental management and climate change mitigation measures can go hand in hand.”