The Merry Mill, a family run organic farm and mill in Co. Laois, has become the first Irish recipient of an EU Organic Award.
The awards, which were launched in 2022, recognise excellence in the organic value chain, from farmers to restaurants, and from small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to bio-districts.
This year’s winners were announced at an official awards ceremony held in Brussels today (Monday, September 25).
The three best projects were selected for each of the eight individual awards, with a total of 24 finalists from 11 EU countries.
Mill
The Scully family, who run the Merry Mill in Vicarstown, produce a range of premium organic gluten-free foods, including Irish organic gluten-free oats, organic gluten-free flour, and organic produce.
Kevin Scully, who founded the Merry Mill, has been an organic farmer for two decades, and has spent the last seven years in food production.
The Merry Mill is Ireland’s only producer of certified organic gluten free oats having built the country’s first organic gluten-free mill seven years ago.
“We do the whole process on our own farm; we grow, we harvest, we mill, we bag and we deliver direct to your door,” Kevin Scully told Agriland.
EU Organic Award
The Merry Mill claimed top honours in the EU Organic Awards best organic food processing SME category after being shortlisted alongside companies from Slovenia and Germany.
“It’s huge because it’s completely on merit. It’s an award with no strings attached. They just had a look at what we’re doing,” Kevin Scully added.
Ireland holds the third-lowest percentage of land under organic farming in the EU.
Scully said that the Merry Mill is “delighted to be competing on the international stage of the organic industry”.
“It’s great to get the recognition at European level considering we’re way behind in Europe, we’re still only about 2.5% in organic.
“You look at France and Germany with huge land masses, they are going onto 7-8%, Austria is at 16% so that’s a huge amount of land and a huge amount of producers. So we’re beyond thrilled to be in that category,” Scully added.
“We’re very unique in Europe. I think we’re one of the only single source, single origin organic-certified gluten-free oat mills in Europe producing all our own produce on our own farm,” he said.
The EU Commission has set a target of 25% of EU agricultural land being under organic farming by 2030.
Scully said there has been “a huge rise in the consumption of organic food” since the Covid-19 pandemic.
“It’s beyond a fad, when people move onto high-quality food, they feel better; it’s beyond taste. The proof, as they say, is in the pudding,” he said.
Around half of the annual harvest from The Merry Mill is now exported to Israel.
“We do one of the only European passover harvests where two rabbis fly in from Jerusalem. They watch the whole harvest, they bring it back over to Israel and they turn it into a matzah cracker, which is the equivalent of communion, for Passover.
“It’s a niche market but it’s a real growth area over there,” Kevin said.
Gillian Westbrook, Irish Organic Association CEO, said: “It is fantastic to see an Irish organic business like the Merry Mill winning such a prestigious EU Organic Award.
“Over the last number of years Kevin and his family, members of the Irish Organic Association, have worked hard to produce and develop a range of organic oat products from gluten-free porridge to flour sold nationally and internationally.
“The award also helps to strengthen the reputation of quality Irish organic products at a time when brand Ireland needs to increase and strengthen organic market offerings both at home and abroad.
“The Merry Mill and the other nominees of this year’s EU Organic Awards show that innovative initiatives across the European organic value chain offer inspiration for organic operators to prosper and develop in Ireland.”
The IOA has said that this will also require Bord Bia, industry and the organic sector to develop the stories behind these products “taking advantage of regional branding to build Ireland’s green image for the future”.
Harvest
Scully said it has been a really difficult year for everyone trying to harvest crops in Ireland given the adverse weather conditions.
“The really good thing for the organic producer is we hadn’t the high input costs gone in, we just had to plough and sow.
“Even myself at the moment there is still 25ac to cut but I have enough porridge until next year anyway.
“I still hope to harvest it but even if I don’t the loss is nothing compared to what the tillage guys are going to be suffering in the mainstream,” he said.