Rebekah:0:01
Hello and welcome to Agriculture Live. My name's Rebekah Shields, I'm from Agricultural Recruitment Specialists, and today I'm being joined by Jack Potter from Wild Capital, and we're going to be talking about biodiversity, net gain and nutrient neutrality. So a lot to talk about there. If you've got any questions or comments, please post them in the chat and we'll get to them at the end. So let's go over to Jack. Welcome, Jack. Would you like to introduce yourself to us?
Jack:0:36
Yeah, hi, Rebekah, my name is Jack Potter and thanks for having me on this. So yeah, I'm sort of a biodiversity net gain and neutrality specialist. I've been working in the industry I guess most of my working life. Started off in government and now I've moved over to the dark side, as my former colleagues call it, into the private sector, sort of delivering it in practice. But yeah, so I'm a I'm a director and co-founder of a company called Wild Capital and we specialise in developing and originating offset schemes in the nutrient neutrality and biodiversity net gain space, and so, yeah, so that's, that's what we do.
Rebekah
So when you were younger, did you always want to get into the biodiversity side, or how did you come about this?
Jack:1:29
So I think I've always had a passion for ecology and I always sort of knew well, I always thought I wanted to go into the ecology space. I didn't know I was going to go into the offsetting industry or be involved in biodiversity net gain, but I mean biodiversity is just another word for nature. So I guess I always wanted to be involved in biodiversity net gain, but I mean biodiversity is just another word for nature. So I guess I always wanted to be involved in nature. But you know, I grew up on a farm.
Jack:1:50
I'm from a long line of farmers on my dad's side and, yeah, I guess, growing up on a farm, being immersed in the environment, you know every single day, even if it is doing a job, an agricultural job, like you know, checking the sheep or whatever it is, or you know driving cattle from one side of the valley to the other through a woodland. You're always immersed in that nature. And I think that's what sparked the interest in me. And I was sort of fortunate enough to have very supportive parents who sort of nurtured that and told me to you know, follow what I was most interested in.
Rebekah:2:26
That's always good. So what makes Wild Capital, you know, stand out from their competitors, would you say?
Jack:2:36
So I think there's a few points really. I mean, I guess from my background in this field - you know I've worked in government, I guess helps define the policies and tools that we now see enshrined in legislation, both for nutrient neutrality and for biodiversity net gain. So I've got a very deep understanding of what the actual underlying drivers are for those markets and also helped establish the methodologies to calculate them and quantify them. So adding value to our customers from day one just from that very deep knowledge and expertise that we can offer to them, I think stands us apart from many of the other competitors who are maybe slightly more opportunistic and maybe don't have that in-house specialty. So I guess that's one sort of USP that we have. One of the other things is that we've got an institutional backer, so we've got sort of very deep pockets. They're a sort of renewable energy, sort of global investment company. We're a very small fry for them but effectively they have deeper pockets than this entire market has to offer, s o we're very lucky on that part. Um, and I guess connected to that, we like to acquire the assets ourselves.
Jack:3:55
So I guess there's sort of two models at the moment in the offsetting industry. One of them is to buy the land outright and one of them is to lease the land, and I guess this is how interactions with the likes of Wild Capital and other offset providers has with the agricultural industry. It's whether it's a sort of buyout for a very inflated value for one of these markets or it's a lease where you have an ongoing payment every year. So we do do both and we're very flexible, which other organisations aren't, but we do prefer to buy. So we will buy land at inflated costs way above market value.
Jack:4:37
And the reason we do that is partly driven by me and one of the reasons I sort of co-founded Wild Capital, and that is, that I don't want to see these measures temporarily.
Jack:4:51
So one of the sort of quirks of the biodiverse metric is that you're only required to do the offset for 30 years. So it's a temporary mitigation or it's a very long time, but it's still temporary and the developments that they're offsetting are actually for perpetuity. They're permanent, permanent impacts on our landscape. So part of the reason for establishing Wild Capital and having this institutional fund to be able to acquire the land itself is so that we can commit that these sites are going to be for nature forever rather than just for a 30-year period and, you know, passing it back to the landowner, who can then do with it what they want, who may well keep it like it is, but they also may then plough it back out and put it back into agriculture. So that's one of the sort of USPs that we're sort of standing apart from others, and it is actually seemingly being quite attractive to customers as well, who have very long-term visions and have maybe been operating for a very long time beyond you know, 30 years ago that they were sort of established.
Rebekah:5:49
Okay. So it's great because you can tell that you've really got a passion for what you do. But some people might not know what biodiversity is, so could you explain that?
Jack:6:02
Yeah. So I guess in its sort of purest sense, biodiversity is just a fancy word for nature. I'm not sure why we've gone down the route of calling it biodiversity rather than nature, because everyone's familiar with the word nature and less so about biodiversity. I think there was a sort of funny BBC poll that they did with the public where they asked people what biodiversity was, and I think most people thought it was some sort of detergent. So I guess that just shows the sort of the level of misunderstanding of some of the terminology that we've chosen to use. Actually, there's a bit of an education piece here about making people understand that biodiversity, you know, it's not, it's not a foreign thing that is for, you know, clever people or just ecologists or something it's, it's something for everyone. And um so so, in terms of what is biodiversity itself, what is nature itself?
Jack:6:57
I always consider it to be sort of three, three different strands. You've got diversity within species. So that means, like the genetic diversity, the sort of, I guess, the resilience of that species by having a diverse gene pool. And there's an example that I remember from when I was doing my GCSEs biology where there's a moth called the peppered moth, which had two different colour variations and there was a light form and a dark form. And then the industrial revolution came along and every surface was blackened with soot and it meant that the dark form was really camouflaged and the light form really stood out and it meant that the light form ended up getting predated lots because it really stood out against and that was just a sort of environmental change that sort of impacted the population, but because it was so diverse within its gene pool, within that species, it was able to survive. So that's sort of one element.
Jack:7:52
And then the other element is what people traditionally consider to be nature or biodiversity, and that is diversity of species. So you know how many different types of birds are there or how many different types of mammals are there. You know they're different, different species, and that's what people traditionally consider to be biodiversity. And then the third one which I think is overlooked and should be integrated more into our thinking, is the diversity between habitats. So, um, if you've got different habitats all next to each other, they they sort of enable more species to be able to occupy that space, because some of them might have part of their life cycle associated with one or sort of multiple habitats, species to be able to occupy that space, because some of them might have part of their life cycle associated with one or sort of multiple habitats rather than just one in isolation. So that's, that's just a sort of overview of, I guess, how I see biodiversity. And yeah, some of those are sort of formal definitions.
Rebekah:8:39
Brilliant thanks, Jack. So why is it so important?
Jack:8:45
Well, there's a number of reasons really. I mean, for me it's sort of intrinsic value, but to quantify it there are sort of other. You know factors which are increasing in knowledge. Obviously, one of them that everyone knows about is food. You know biodiversity, wildlife are sort of required in many instances to pollinate crops, for example, if you lose them. We don't want to go and end up down the route of some locations in China where they're hand pollinating fruit trees, for example, with brushes. You know they offer a service and that can actually be quantified in a monetary value.
Jack:9:23
You know it's required for clean air. You know all the impacts that we have on the environment, biodiversity, nature, the environment. It can counteract that, so it can buffer our impact on the environment and actually recover it. So having clean air is obviously really important, especially in our built environment, which is how I guess it ties into biodiversity net gain. Clean water as well. Biodiversity plays a crucial role in cleaning water, which is connected to nutrient neutrality, the health of our waterways and the ability to strip out nutrients and chemicals and things through wetlands.
Jack:9:57
And then there's also health and well-being. That's increasing in knowledge. Now GP's are now prescribing people to actually go and immerse themselves in nature or go and do some activities to to like 5k walks or things like that. Um, also, medicine as well. You know, medicine is something that we don't know enough about nature. We don't know enough about all species to know what's going to be useful in the future. Um, just as an example, aspirin was discovered from a plant called meadowsweet, which is a fairly widespread plant in the UK, and aspirin is obviously is a very widespread drug. So all of these things that they're very useful, and sometimes we don't know when they're going to be useful or even whether they're there or not. So yeah, I guess that's my overview.
Rebekah:10:49
So what strategies have we got, as a country, you know, in relation to biodiversity and being more aware of nature?
Jack:11:11
So in terms of strategies, I think there's a big movement at the moment for biodiversity and for recovering our landscape and that's through both the public sector and the private sector. And obviously through the public sector it's fairly well known. You know there's government grant funding which gets allocated, you know. I'm not going to comment on the stewardship related schemes and how effective they are, but they tend to add things to an already existing complex system rather than remove it. And whether they've been paying enough money for the right solutions remains to be seen, I think. But I think there's a place probably for a blend of private and public funds in different situations.
Jack:11:57
Obviously, the public funds is very well known to farmers and I think there's probably some way to go to improve that. But the private side of it is, I guess, what I specialise in, which is these nature markets. Biodiversity and again, the nutrient neutrality are just two of those and we're going to see a lot more in the future, probably through they call it sort of voluntary biodiversity markets where, effectively, companies have to quantify their impacts on nature and then offset that obviously reduce it first, but then offset it and landowners and farmers are going to be crucial to being able to provide that solution to them. So I guess there is a sort of there's a direction of travel. Whether there's a strategy or not, I don't know, probably not, but I guess it's. Uh, it's probably public pressure and, yeah, partly government driven agendas, which is going to drive this.
Rebekah:12:52
So are there many job opportunities within this sector, would you say?
Jack:12:57
Oh, it's absolutely massive. Yeah, I mean I never thought that when I started down this road, when I left university, that I would be in a very high demand area. You know, as far as I was aware it was, there was more people applying for jobs than there were jobs. So you ended up getting squeezed down and you know you'd end up basically not getting paid very much for doing a job. And that didn't bother me because I was passionate about it, and I actually selected the organisation I worked for based on who paid the poorest. That might sound really strange, but I wanted to. I wanted to have more responsibility for the wage that I had. So I thought, well, people who are paying the worst are going to be giving more responsibility for that wage, and there'll also be less qualified people applying for those jobs, so I'm more likely to get it.
Jack:13:54
So then, and that was a clever way of thinking and I ended up scaling up through the through the company fairly, fairly rapidly, because because I was effectively overqualified and underpaid, which was great if you want to succeed through that company. But it was difficult to break in and I think since then it is completely turned on its head and the number of people that are moving from company to company, being headhunted and all sorts is unreal. People are moving around all the time just because there isn't enough expertise in this industry. This industry, um, because it's new, it's nascent, um, and, yeah, there's not enough people coming through. I think that's potentially going to be an issue okay.
Rebekah:14:35
So Andrew's posted a comment there, Andrew Goff. He said "you know you've done a great description. It's nature is what biodiversity is. But what career opportunities are there in the space for students still at school and maybe a year away from leaving school?
Jack:15:00
I mean my way in was through the conservation charities, into this conservation space, that there are other routes in fact I'm probably quite unusual in the way that I've ended up in now through that, through that route. But conservation charities do offer apprenticeships um internships. So I started on an internship so I wasn't paid anything but I had free accommodation, , and, yeah, basically , some savings to fund, you know, feeding myself, basically. But it didn't take very long to get on the ladder on that organisation just because you're already on the inside at that point and you can get help from people who you know, who already have jobs on the inside to help you to get, to get the ladder basically onto a paid role. So that was my way in. But I know that there are a lot of other people who I work with and people who are in a similar position to me they've gone through the going to sort of.
Jack:16:04
I mean, I did go to university, but a lot of people have gone through the university to ecological consulting degrees so that they go straight into an ecological consulting job.
Jack:16:14
A lot of ecological consultants will do postgraduate well, they do graduate positions and they'll hire seasonal staff, you know, for basically the summer, for the season, for the survey seasons. You can build up your experience and your licenses that you need for species, for example or in my case it was chainsaw ticket and brush cutter and you know those sorts of things. So there's different ways into the market and you could end up ending in the same place as someone else who came from a different route. But I guess, yeah, the the main thing is to to shine, I think, um to really throw yourself into it. I think if you, if you sort of sit back and and don't pull your weight and really immerse yourself in it and show that you're committed and and you've got good work ethic, regardless of what route you go into committed and you've got good work ethic, regardless of what route you go into then it's going to be tricky for you to scale and break into the industry.Rebekah:17:19
Are there many apprenticeships that are available? Do you know?
Jack:17:24
I'm probably not that familiar with it. What's the situation today? It's not something I've looked into recently. At the time when I was applying, it was, there was a few internships. I think there may have been one or two apprenticeships as well. Um, but yeah, I think they are. They are still around and it's it is a really good way to get into it, and I guess the thing to think about is it is a short-term thing and probably the more you commit yourself to it, the shorter it will be. So, um, yeah, some people are put off by apprenticeships and internships because on its own it doesn't look great, but as a way to break into something, it's probably one of the best routes yeah.
Rebekah
Jay has just said "when will biodiversity net gain become mandatory? There is a delay for smaller developments?
Jack:18:34
So that's for major developments. But for small sites there was a small delay.
The reality is, larger size probably hasn't even felt the impacts of mandatory biodiversity net gain because they spend so long in the planning system.
Jack:18:43
So smaller sites, because they're smaller, they have smaller impacts and there's a risk that the cost of the environmental benefit is actually similar to the cost of administrating that purchase of that environmental benefit. So you almost need a structure and a system set up to enable smaller sites to be able to just contribute easily at low cost to an existing scheme. And when mandatory biodiversity net gain was announced in February, that's that's when everyone started moving almost, and and it wasn't that that system wasn't set up. Now, obviously, we're in April and small sites are now live in terms of them being mandatory as well now, um, and we're still not at that stage. So I suspect that when small sites go through the system quicker and maybe two or three months time, there's going to be maybe a lot of people screaming about the fact that there's no solution for them to be able to just contribute easily into.
Rebekah
Okay, so can you tell us what net gain is?
Jack:19:51
Net gain is simply just balancing the books of nature from an impact of a development site and adding a bit more into it. So you've got a development site that may well be impacting some species poor grassland, for example, or an arable field or something on the edge of a town, and they're building some sheds or they're building some houses and that nature gets quantified through the biodiversity metric. So that's what I was working in Natural England and in government teams helping to build and define the policies for, and it quantifies nature effectively and so an arable field will have a have a value in biodiversity units and then the impact of that from the development. So the development will be able to map out.
Jack:20:38
So we're going to destroy everything, for example, and we're going to put some sheds here and some houses here and we're going to have a bit of green space over here with some drainage features and whatever.
Jack:20:49
And then they can start saying, okay, well, on the development site we've actually got the drainage feature which has biodiversity value. We can quantify that in the metric. And we're going to have a rain garden or some open green space or some road verges and they've all got quantifiable biodiversity values that can get put into the metric and then, effectively, the metric will balance those books for you and say, okay, well, is it a net gain or is it a net loss or is it net neutral? And if there's a net loss or it's net neutral and there's a requirement to go above and beyond, then you need to offset. So that's where the offsetting, that's where, while capital, that's where we come in um offering to sell those, those, uh, those requirements, the shortfalls in the metric from the development to the developer to offer them a service to balance their books for nature.
Rebekah:21:40
Okay, and so I just wanted to ask about nutrient neutrality. How would you define that?
Jack:21:58
So nutrient neutrality is much simpler in concept but much more tricky in terms of the solutions. So it's just a couple of chemicals, basically, that are impacting our waterways. It's nitrogen and phosphorus, um, and there's different catchments which are impacted by different chemicals. It was all driven by some uh, european legislation which was then enshrined in british legislation and a piece of case law which effectively said if our, if our designated sites or our sort of jewels in the crown of our environment, are not meeting their conservation objectives, if they're failing as a result of nutrients, then you can't add any more to it. You can't give a permission which adds any more to it, because you're just making the situation worse.
Jack:22:38
So, in the case of the sites in the UK we have sort of saltwater systems, so harbours at the end of river, systems that meet the sea, and generally they're limited by nitrogen. So nitrogen will be the limiting factor to the environmental response which is impacting those sites and that's generally macroalgae. So you get these algal mats which form and that's directly as a result of two high levels of nitrogen. And that algal mat will smother salt marshes, it will smother the mudflats and birds won't be able to be able to get to the mud and it will change the chemistry of the mud. So it starts really degrading those sites.
Jack:23:16
And when you've got permissions being granted, for example for a new housing development, then that would be more water going to the sewer network, and the sewer network doesn't treat it to 100% efficiency. There's always a residual amount that comes out of the pipe and that will mean there's more nutrients going into the, into the system. So the legislation basically says you can't add any more so that permission can't be granted then unless you prove that you're removing something from the system. So that's how neutrality plays into this. So nutrient neutrality It's a one-in-one out system. It's very similar to the likes of carbon offsetting, but it's much more geographically constrained, so it needs to be where the impact is happening. The offset, the sort of one-in-one-out process, needs to be happening within the same catchment.
Rebekah:24:05
So what river systems?
Jack:24:08
You also have river systems which are more impacted by phosphorus and geographically that's much more tricky because you need to where the impact is on that river system. You also need to offset with sort of from that point or above. So this is all. This is all, I guess, a sticking plaster, temporarily, until the designated sites get restored, which is the ultimate goal, and that's the responsibility the government need to take on.
Rebekah:24:34
So what does all of this mean for the future? What's the impact?
Jack:24:41
Well, I guess, nutrient neutrality - I think everyone would probably hope that it is a temporary requirement. Temporary requirements I think it's probably a little bit of a bonfire under the arses of the government to get them to sort of spring into action. They tried to get rid of nutrient neutrality and sort of cut it out of legislation, but the reality is it's here to stay. I think it's been very difficult and probably quite dangerous for the environment for them to unpick nutrient neutrality now. So I think they're left with the only option of restoring the designated sites and trying to make the nutrient neutrality market work. So that's, I guess, a probably short to medium term offset market which is probably going to be here and, yeah, I guess the timescale probably depends on your faith in the government's delivery.
Jack:25:38
Biomass net gain is a very different story. It's more of a positive news story rather than negative. This is a direction of travel. Historically it's always been only concentrating on protected species, impacts of developments on protected species, but now we're moving much more to a holistic environment position. Protected species, but now we're moving much more to a holistic environment position.
Jack:25:58
Um, it may well even go further than that in the future and and sort of go into, you know, access to nature for people and things for those development sites, and this is very exciting space which is sort of gaining momentum. And I think this is just the first industry. So the development industry is a very obvious one that sort of has a one point in time where it destroys the environment and you can then go and do something to make that right and then secure it. So it's a very easy one to sort of trial this on. I think what's really exciting for me is is how how this is going to cascade into other companies, into the more voluntary market, voluntary biodiversity markets, and that is just going to ramp up and I think it will be a global market and it's only just started.
Rebekah:26:41
So I think it's a really big opportunity in the future, so there will be lots of job opportunities available within this industry, won't there? Yeah, it's going to be expanding massively so a question I wanted to know, Jack is how do we relate in relation to other countries for our biodiversity schemes and so on?
Jack:27:01
So Biodiversity Net Gain was actually brought across from Australia. So I think Australia effectively coined the idea of quantifying, using a metric nature and and using it to be able to quantify whether something is having a benefit or a negative. So we're definitely not the first, but I do think that we're probably the most advanced in terms of government legislating it and making it mandatory. I don't think it'll be too long before others follow. I know Germany are making movements towards this sort of approach. Scotland have just got a consultation out at the moment about that, because biodiversity net gain only relates to England at the moment. But I think Scotland are looking to modify the English metrics for Scottish purposes so that we'll be going down a similar approach. But I think the development industry is probably one that's easy for people to almost dip their toe in the water of biodiversity net gain and I think it's a good one to ease into the voluntary market.
Rebekah:28:06
And do you think the government does take this seriously enough?
Jack:28:11
Yeah, 100 percent. Yeah, I think, for biodiversity net gain? I think they certainly do. And it's been a long time coming. You know this is 10 years in the making, so the industry has had plenty of time to respond to this, to understand it, to be able to respond to it in enough time to make it work for developments in the short term. But it's been eased into it. There's been a lot of consultation processes and it's been evolved, which is what's needed to bring something new to a market.
Jack:28:46
And I think the way that they've structured it is perfect for a private market. So it's all designed to encourage private investment into this industry rather than it being subsidised by government. So there's statutory credits which the government provides, which effectively sort of, if you're stuck and you can't find an offset, then you can go to the statutory credits. But they purposely sort of made them very, very expensive, which effectively means that it's not being, it's not undercutting the private market. So it encourages private market to come forwards and actually offer these solutions up - neutrality.
Jack:29:19
On the other hand, I think to date everyone's been hoping it would go away and there's been a lot of mumblings and nothing certain from government, which all it's done is created a lot of uncertainty in the market and that's created a lot of nervousness.
Jack:29:36
So it's a very currently considered as a very volatile market and the government have just pumped in lots of money to each individual catchment which is affected and the remit is sort of spend it on nutrient mitigation and some local authorities are proposing to do their own mitigation and they're probably going to be charging that at cost. So again, that creates huge uncertainties for that market. And you know, if you're progressing a nutrient scheme, for example, which might take nine, twelve months to bring forwards and cost hundreds of thousands of pounds, and then the local authority are progressing one in the background and they flood the market with credits at cost, suddenly your scheme is not viable and they flood the market with credits at cost. Suddenly your scheme is not viable and you spend lots of money at risk. So I think there needs to be a lot more direction from government currently and also transparency over different types of schemes before that sort of joins the level of biodiversity net gain in terms of the planning process.
Rebekah:30:37
So what can the agricultural and farming industry do to be more nature focused, would you say?
Jack:30:49
I guess I mean the one which is widespread is obviously the government funding side of things. There's lots of cluster farms which are popping up all over the place now. Um, I know our own family farm was part of a cluster farm for many years. Um, to understand, I guess, holistically, across a landscape, what, what is actually best for your landscape, and having some advice from an expert ecologist, you you know what's important on your farm and you know what it's special for, because something might be common to you but actually in the context of the UK it might be very rare and it might be very special. So, understanding those sorts of things and what you're interested in pursuing and progressing, and then you know the likes of the government grant system ideal, it's very bureaucratic but it's, but it is ideal to fund that sort of approach.
Jack:31:43
Um, yeah, and there's, I guess there's the voluntary market to keep an eye on biodiversity net gain. Um, you know, there's obviously the selling of selling of parcels of land which are maybe poor pieces of land agriculturally, they might lie wet and they might not particularly yield high for agriculture, but for biodiversity it might be absolutely perfect. In fact, it quite often is the case that that is the case, and there's also the lease side of things, yeah, but I mean advice on on what you've got is probably the probably the first step, and cluster farms and ecologists are, I guess, the probably the best route for that.
Rebekah
And there's been a big push with tree planting and things like that, hasn't there?
Jack:32:34
Yeah, people love trees. You can name them and say a million trees, and people can hear a number in their head and think that's great, yeah, so it's the right trees in the right place, as people say. And yeah, there's government funding to plant trees. I think I mean this isn't my area of expertise but I know there's a sort of carbon um, carbon market opportunity with a blend of sort of public and private finance where the government will pay to plant the trees and um private finance, through carbon offsetting, would effectively, uh, create the yield which is required to make it work for a farm. So, yeah, there's various opportunities like that um, and there are also companies that are saying you know, for every you know. I spoke to one a year ago or so. He said for every piece of equipment they sell, you know they sell telehandlers, and for every telehandler they sell, they'll plant a tree. And they accumulated a pot of money and came to me and said, right, we need to plant some trees, where do we plant them? And this is how much we've got.
Rebekah:33:33
So, yeah, there's there are some probably niche opportunities like that which might be useful so there's going to be lots of new opportunities for in terms of recruitment in this market and in terms of new entrants into the sector. Um, what would you say in terms of attracting people into this area? How could we do more of that?
Jack:34:03
I mean, I think it's work experience.
Jack:34:05
I think would a lot of people who work in this industry are genuinely really passionate about it and I think I personally feel like just exposing yourself to someone who is really passionate about something is actually enough to spark an enthusiasm in it. So I think shadowing people having work experience maybe when you're at school, or maybe looking at internships, apprenticeships, type thing, to to, to be exposed to those sorts of people, um, I think is a is a good way to spark an interest. Um, but yeah, maybe maybe at the education side as well, there could be more to be done. I know when I was in school and also at university, there's probably a lot to be desired in terms of opening doors and making you aware of these opportunities.
Jack:34:50
I certainly didn't know that this was something that was coming down the road and could be an opportunity to go into and specialise, specialize in, so there's probably a few things yeah, definitely.
Rebekah:35:02
And I think things move so fast that jobs, that when we were at school weren't even there, that you know that are now for us to even consider.
Jack
Yeah, I know, 100%, same with me.
Jack:35:18
I didn't think I'd be doing this when I was at university or at school. Yeah, I think for me I never really went into this industry thinking that it was going to be, you know, there's gonna be lots of jobs available and it's going to be, um, you know, really lucrative or anything. I went into this industry because I'm genuinely passionate about it. It is my life passion and, and I would have done it whatever happens it's just completely by chance that there are.
Jack:35:48
You know, there's quite a high demand for jobs at the moment, but I think, even if there wasn't, I'd still be really happy, and I think that's really important to do something that you are genuinely interested in. So, yeah, I wouldn't necessarily encourage people solely to go down this route, you know, purely because there's a job available, but most people do like nature when they get to know it, though, and I think it's a difficult thing for people not to be inspired by it when especially when you're surrounded by people who are passionate about it.
Rebekah
I think like the young people now are a lot more environmentally aware than, say, 20 years ago.
Jack
Yeah 100%
Jack:36:31
Yeah, it's definitely going up the public agenda. I think there probably is quite a bit to do in terms of educating what's important, because I think sometimes headlines and things that can get people's that need attention, that don't get that, that public sort of airing, which needs it definitely.
Rebekah:37:06
Well, thanks, Jack. I've really enjoyed talking to you today. We've had some good questions which we've covered. It's given me a lot to think about. I'm sure the viewers, listeners, will have a lot to think about too. Thank you everybody for watching and joining us today, and thank you, Jack. If you've got an interesting topic in agriculture or farming or related that you would like to talk about, please contact me via Agricultural Recruitment Specialists, which is www.agrirs.com. And all that's left to say is thanks again. Would you like to say goodbye, Jack?
Jack:37:42
Yeah, Thanks for having me Rebekah, it's been a pleasure thank you.
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