Edith Mary Gayton Memorial Lecture: Food and farming: managing agricultural production systems in turbulent times

The annual Edith Mary Gayton Memorial Lecture will be held on Tuesday 21 February 2017. Edith Mary Gayton was an agricultural graduate of the University of Reading in the 1930s. Little is known of her later career and life but, in his will, her husband made a bequest to Reading in her memory stipulating that the funds should be used in the field of agriculture and management. The annual Memorial Lecture is one use of these funds.

Our lecture this year will be delivered by Judith Batchelar. Judith is the director of Sainsbury’s Brand for 13 years. Judith is responsible for all aspects of Sainsbury’s product offer, from Policy formation on aspects such as Animal Welfare, Ethical and Sustainable Sourcing, through to Product Technology, Product Development, Product Safety, and Packaging.  Essentially, she drives the Quality and Innovation agendas whilst protecting and enhancing the reputation of Sainsbury’s Brand. She has worked in the food and drink industry for 35 years.  Judith is a member of the Institute of Food Science and Technology (IFST), and fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and Manufactures, and for the last 3 years has Co-Chaired the Government’s AgriFoodTech Council working on the implementation of the UK’s first AgriFood sector strategy.

The lecture will be held in the Madejski Lecture Theatre, Agriculture Building at the University of Reading. Refreshments will be available from 18:15 hrs and the lecture will commence at 19:00.