About the Scheme

Are you a Holstein Young Breeder? Why not take advantage of our free mentoring support.

Growing your own dairy herd, taking over your family farm or setting out in the dairy industry for the first time can be challenging! Holstein UK endeavours to help and assist all young members as your success is critical to the industry’s long term sustainability.

As a Holstein Young Breeder, you can take advantage of the Mentoring Scheme which enables you to access valuable skills and knowledge from those experienced across all aspects of the industry. Our mentors can advise you and help you with your business and future career.

Typical skills of our mentors can include:

• A wealth of knowledge of experience of dairy farming and running farm businesses
• Succession planning for your family business
• Advice from professionals from all aspects of the industry
• Finance and business planning advice
• Skills for planning for the future
• Knowledge of promoting your business online and utilising social media
• Progressive networking

Strict confidence applies to all parties involved and any information that either party receives is to be treated as confidential.

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Holstein Young Breeder Jessica Langton signed up to the Mentoring Scheme in 2020. Find out more about Jessica and how the programme is going for her.

I am the fourth generation of my family's dairy and beef farm in Derbyshire. We predominantly milk pedigree Holsteins and Friesians, averaging 8,500 litres at 4.4% fat and 3.53% protein. We farm 140 acres of grassland and focus on obtaining milk from forage. I also study BSc Animal Science at the University of Nottingham and I was recently successful at securing a place on the NFU dairy board as one of their appointees.

Alongside my degree and working on the farm, I work part-time for Genus ABS as a Reproductive Management Specialist on their Insights Programme. I thoroughly enjoy this as it provides me with the opportunity to meet a large range of farmers and see a wide range of farming systems in operation. 

I chose to join the HYB Mentoring Scheme as I wanted to expand my knowledge of genetics and genomics. I was assigned Dr Darren Todd as my mentor and he has helped build on my knowledge and expanded it in my areas of interest – genomics and inbreeding. Participating in the Mentoring Scheme has helped me solidify some of the knowledge I’ve gained from my degree and also helped my understanding of the pedigree Holstein cow. My mentor meetings are monthly and at each meeting, we decide the next topic so that something can be prepared.

I would recommend the Mentoring Scheme to any HYB member. The programme has given me access to knowledge from experts of the breed and I’ve a better understanding of genomics and how this has helped progress the Holstein cow in more recent years. My future goals are to apply this knowledge to my undergraduate dissertation as I’ve chosen to focus this on reproduction and fertility. I’m also hoping to go on to do a PHD and specialise in this area. 

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Who can apply?

Mentoring support is available to all current HYB members.

Apply online

To submit an application to express interest for free mentoring, please complete the HYB Mentoring Support Form 

For further information, please email hyb@holstein-uk.org or call Naomi (National HYB Coordinator ) on 07593 440428