RETIRED dairy farmer Jerry Rider has received national recognition for his championship of low-cost, low-yield grazing that has saved some farmers from bankruptcy.

Mr Rider, who used to farm at Horton House Farm, in Horton, near Devizes, received the Royal Association of British Dairy Farmers' Princess Royal Award from the Princess herself at Buckingham Palace last week.

He said: "It really was a most impressive affair. We were driven straight through the gates of Buckingham Palace and, even though she had been held up, the Princess spent a good 20 minutes chatting to us."

Mr Rider has been involved in spreading the word about the New Zealand management concept of taking more milk from grazed grass since he first entered agriculture more than 50 years ago.

He said: "I came from a non-farming background, so I had no family or peer pressure on me to carry on in any family tradition."

Mr Rider studied agriculture at Wye College of the University of London where he was influenced by the late Professor Mac Cooper, a New Zealander who championed their system of low-cost dairy farming.

On leaving college, Mr Rider went to work for Stanley Morrey at Horton House, one of the few farmers in Britain who operated the New Zealand system and who received the OBE for his work.

Mr Rider married his boss's daughter, Carol, and eventually took over the tenancy of the farm in 1978.

Mr Rider became a member of the British Grassland Society and was its president in 1996/97, when he pushed the New Zealand system and shared the low-tech management system with many dairy farmers in the UK.

He said: "Many of them say, if it wasn't for you, Jerry, we'd be out of business.

"The cow is a ruminant animal and should be out eating grass, not cooped up in a shed."

But pioneering the system in Britain did not prove as easy as he and Mrs Rider first thought. They fell foul of the agro-chemical lobby, which did not take kindly to the idea of someone discouraging farmers from buying their products.

But the couple persevered and now more than 500 farms in the UK operate their system.

Mrs Rider said: "It's not for everyone. It is very hard work. You have to walk the farm every week to work out how much grazing each field can sustain and where to put up your fences.

"It's so much easier to ask your feed rep how much you need to feed your cattle."

Independent surveys have shown that milk from grazing is healthier than that from cows fed on silage and supplements, being higher in polyunsaturated fats.