Free Range Egg Facilities, Staplehurst

Supporting Kent's rural business community has always been an area of DHA expertise. This includes its work with Fridays, the family-owned free range egg producer, which has recently secured planning permission to replace two outdated 40-year-old rearing sheds at Tolehurst Farm, near Staplehurst.

The new sheds are part of Fridays' ongoing investment in new free range egg production. Measuring 120m long by 26.6m wide, they represent modern best practice and will feature technologies like mechanical ventilation to help maintain high standards of welfare.

During the application DHA worked closely with Tunbridge Wells Borough Council and successfully demonstrated all environmental matters had been addressed. Fridays' commitment to improving its environmental performance has also seen DHA secure permission for an anaerobic digester (AD) to be built and operated at the egg producer's Knoxbridge Farm, near Staplehurst. It will be used to process up to 57,500 tonnes of chicken manure a year from Fridays' own egg producing activities.

The AD involves microbes digesting the manure in sealed anaerobic conditions with ammonia stripping technology. It will produce significantly less odorous digestate, which can be used as a fertilizer, and enough biogas to power 2,000 homes via the grid. DHA is currently advising Fridays on its proposed £8m Wealden Woods Free Range Farm on land at Reed Court Farm at Chainhurst, near Hunton. The project is seeking permission to create three industry-leading hen houses, each home to 64,000 hens, and includes the planting of 20 hectares of new woodland and woodland pasture with a mix of native species.

The modern poultry houses benefit from air conditioning, automated feed and water dispensing systems and egg and manure collection conveyors which allow for high standards of hen welfare to be achieved.