Interested tenant farmers visit Sark dairy

Maj Beaumont says he is looking forward to artisan cheeses and butter being back in production

Three interested parties have come forward to run Sark Dairy Farm after its last milking cows were moved off the island.

Previous tenants Jason and Katherine Salisbury formally left the farm to return to the UK in March - but the search for a new tenant continues.

Maj Christopher Beaumont, chairman of Sark Dairy Trust, said the notice period to replace the dairy farm's tenants "proved much too short in hindsight", but said three candidates had shown an interest.

Maj Beaumont, who is also Sark's Seigneur, said the island should be "striving" to look after itself when it came to dairy production.

Yoghurts, ice cream, butter

He added: "That's what we should all be striving to be, I think, be as sustainable as we can.

"Making sure that we can produce as much product as we consume locally has to be a good thing to do."

He said two of the interested candidates had visited the site, with the third expected to visit soon.

"I am looking forward to having more sort of Sark product available.

"Artisan cheeses, yoghurts, ice cream, butter."

He added: "I'm really looking forward to seeing that back in production."

The chairman said prospective farmers had been asked how they would be able to incorporate an apprenticeship scheme to support the farm in the future.