Event encourages students to grow a career in horticulture at CAFRE's Greenmount campus

THE College of Agriculture, Food and Rural Enterprise held their 14th annual ‘Opportunities in Horticulture Careers Fair’ for students studying Horticulture and Floristry at CAFRE, Greenmount Campus, Antrim.

David Dowd as Acting Head of Horticulture at CAFRE welcomed and introduced the guest speakers to staff and students.

He reflected on some significant milestones, namely that horticulture has been taught at CAFRE for over 100 years, with floristry courses being taught for 25 years also. This year also marks the 40th anniversary of the formation of the Charted Institute of Horticulture, an important industry body.

With these milestones in mind Mr Dowd reflected that ‘the future for horticulture is an exciting one’.

“There are many challenges facing the world today and horticulture plays a crucial role in solving them. From sustainably feeding the nation, to promoting good mental health and wellbeing and fighting climate change.

“There has never been a more exciting time to choose a career in horticulture.”

The talks commenced with Fionnuala McAuley, Ireland representative for Van der Plas Flowers and Plant and Chair of the Institute of Flowers.

She took the audience through an overview of her career to date, from working in her aunt’s flower shop to successfully running her own business. Fionnuala’s advice for budding CAFRE horticulture and floristry students was to ‘strive to stand out following my approach to vow to dare to be different’.

At every opportunity she would promote her business, her skills and herself, wearing flowers at every networking event, on one occasion wearing a dress made entirely out of flowers!

Fionnuala has been a buyer for Van der Plas for 20 years and stressed the importance of building relationships and personal contacts with customers and suppliers.

Fionnuala wrapped things up with some sound advice for our students. Work in retail to gain experience, create connections, buy the best produce you can and to ‘Be Brave’.

Next up was international guest speaker and past student David Wilson, Director in Marketing at Overdevest Nurseries, who joined virtually from his home in New Jersey, USA. David is originally from Kilskeery in County Tyrone and moved to the USA.

David gave an impressive resume of his education and career journey in horticulture. He spoke about his upbringing on a farm, how he enjoyed growing plants but perhaps didn’t really understand what horticulture was until he went and studied Horticulture at CAFRE.

David underlined the importance of attitude in success, his presentation being aptly named “Keep ‘er lit and give her the gutty!”

He acknowledged that he did not achieve great results academically. However, whilst at school he made one of the best, and most important, decisions of his life, which was to join his local Young Farmers’ Club.

David credited this decision with developing him as a person, giving him confidence and highlighted to students the importance of getting involved in extracurricular activities such as the YFC where you can learn valuable, practical life skills.

He emphasised that,: “When you develop knowledge and skill, it is easily carried, and you carry it for the rest of your life.”

David provided an overview of the setup and the roles at the Overdevest Nursery where he works as Director in Marketing.

The nursery has a huge 400 acres in production, and they are known in the trade for having very high-quality stock which helps to retain an impressive 350 commercial customers.

David was an inspirational speaker with some excellent advice for aspiring horticulturists. His key points were to: “Grab opportunities, embrace challenges, be passionate, acquire knowledge and skill, learn from the best, have fun, keep at it and never give up.”

The final speaker for the morning was David Richardson, Director of Horticulture at the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) and President of the Chartered Institute of Horticulture (CIH).

David has worked for the CWGC for over 35 years is currently leading initiatives on sustainability and the future of this global historic estate.

He is ultimately responsible for a staff of 850 gardeners, working across 153 territories, at 23,000 locations, maintaining 1.1 million headstones and almost 100 million square metres of grass.

He shared with us some of the locations he has visited, lived and worked in.

These included Gallipoli, Iraq, Singapore, Hong Kong, Egypt, Europe and the UK, with sites ranging from small, such as a four-person cemetery on Ocracoke Island, to the vast war graves of the World Wars in Europe.

David highlighted the challenges maintaining such a huge estate presents to the CWGC, with a particular note on sustainability and efficiency, such as embracing technology like robotic mowers, which frees up his staff so they can focus on higher value work.

The estate also has sites in every type of climate, which brings its own difficulties, with water shortages, extreme heat, high levels of rainfall, all of which are intensifying due to climate change.

Efforts are being made to replace traditional lawn areas with native species, suited to the local climate and more capable of dealing with the effects of climate change.

David is originally from Dungannon, Co Tyrone and obtained a degree in Horticulture from Bath University before joining the CWGC. His talk on his career to date opened the eyes of students to the opportunities worldwide in horticulture.

Following on from the three guest speakers there was a brief panel discussion based on extracurricular achievements which included five CAFRE students. Harry Fitzsimmons and Alan Mayers participated in World Skills, both achieving gold medals.

Kyle Ross and Pierce Clarke entered the CIH Young Horticulturist of the Year and competed in the regional finals. Mary-Anne Farenden was the 2022 winner of Super Garden and Bloom Bronze medal winner, and recipient of the Colegrave Bursary, Richard Murray.

The panel were asked questions about their experiences and provided students with an insight on their achievements and how to get involved.

After the morning talks, the students attended the ‘Opportunities in Horticulture’ Careers Fair which attracted over 30 exhibitors. Businesses included a broad range of horticulture employers with many promoting student work placements or graduate employment.

In the afternoon the Horticulture and Floristry students attended a Speed Networking event involving five professionals currently working within the horticulture and floristry industry. Students engaged through interactive discussions, with the industry representatives who shared their career journeys, discussing the challenges and opportunities horticulture presented them.

Commenting on the Careers Fair, event organiser Caithriona McCrudden, Lecturer at CAFRE said: “I wish to extend a heartfelt thanks our all the speakers, employers and organisations who participated in our Opportunities in Horticulture Careers Day. Your enthusiasm to be part of it provided invaluable support and our students an excellent platform to engage with businesses. It was truly and inspiring day!”

Greenmount Campus, Antrim offers Horticulture courses from Level 2 through to BSc (Honours) Degree level. The campus is hosting an Open Day on Wednesday 26 March. For more information, please visit the events section of www.cafre.ac.uk to book to attend