Flahavan's, Not your run of the mill oats

Flahavan’s wins Best Green Grocery Manufacturer 2020

Flahavan’s, Ireland’s oldest privately owned family-run food business, has been awarded Best Green Grocery Manufacturer 2020 in this year’s Green Food and Beverage Producer Awards.

The Green Food & Beverage Producer Awards 2020 live event was hosted on Thursday 5th November by leading business journalist, Richard Curran. In total 19 companies were recognised across 15 different categories as part of the live digital broadcast, which offered a platform to celebrate Ireland’s food and beverage businesses large and small who have demonstrated excellence in sustainability over the past year.

Flahavan’s has been milling oats for seven generations at the family mill in Kilmacthomas, Co. Waterford. During its 235 years in business the Flahavan’s family has demonstrated a strong commitment to putting sustainability into practice in a number of ways. For example, a water turbine installed in 1935 on the original millstream which runs alongside the family mill on the river Mahon, helps generate 10% of company’s electricity requirements. In addition, the company has invested more recently in a bio-mass boiler, which burns oat husks (by-product) instead of fossil fuels; solar panels and a wind turbine to help self-generate 70% of its total energy requirement in 2020. Committed to local sourcing its oats from growers located within a 60 mile radius of its Mill, Flahavan’s has also successfully reduced its carbon footprint by >70% in the past decade.