Meet the Steering Group - Rupert Knowles

As a child, I remember trotting round our orchard with my father and a large black umbrella.  We gave the branches a sharp tap and caught the bugs that fell.  We were looking for black-kneed capsids, a predator of red spider mites.  Today people are still talking about introducing IPM (Integrated Pest Management) on farms but we were doing it then in the ‘50s!  I was teaching the same technique with the umbrella to Afghan fruit growers in 2010.

Looking through my computer, I find files on climate change dating to 2009; and in 2015, I attended an on-line course at the Stockholm Resilience Centre on Planetary Boundaries which I followed by reading Kate Raworth’s ‘Doughnut Economics’.  So I have always had an interest in the countryside, in farming, in weather and climate change and our beautiful blue planet.

I cannot remember how I was introduced to CA-WN, probably through my good friends Jonathan Harris and Christine Ware. It was in summer 2021.  In February 2022, I was organising HOP22 – a joint venture between Harlestone Parish Council (HPC) and CA-WN – our own COP.  Why ‘HOP’? This meaningless name was suggested by Sarah Stock, Chair of HPC, and as no one knows what COP stands for, it seemed a good idea!

Because of my lifelong career in fruit and farming, I am ‘Farming Correspondent’ for CA-WN.  Whilst Biodiversity is an important part of CA-WN’s work, I feel that Climate is by far the biggest issue.  Farming has a big part to play in reducing greenhouse gas emissions, yet still feeding eight billion plus mouths.  Our Mother Earth will outlast me at the age of 80, but the future is bleak for my wife, Lana, and for our daughter, Pippa, who is 16.  I do what I can for them.