Successes, upgrades, and what’s next for the beet supply chain’s digitalisation journey

4 February 2026

As we approach the end of the 2025/26 Campaign, we’re sharing the latest on industry-wide efforts to digitalise the beet supply chain through three initiatives designed to improve Campaign for everyone.

Watch the video update below and read on.

The first - “Lifted” - tracks fields as they are harvested and creates a digital harvesting record. The app aids planning, navigation from field to field, and record-keeping, while helping to make sure beet is delivered to factory efficiently by sharing a timely digital record of the clamp location and estimated tonnage with the haulier.

For this Campaign, we made significant upgrades by retrofitting tablets in harvester cabs which saw operators benefit from a larger, clearer screen which has navigation and progress reporting all in one place.

Upgrades made for this Campaign as a result of everyone’s feedback - including maps which show overhead powerlines - have been well received.

Thanks to the support and dedication of harvester operators who continue to get lift records in, “Lifted” has been valuable in providing greater visibility of Campaign progress, with remarkable accuracy in many areas.

More than 100 harvesting contractors have been participating with “Lifted” this Campaign. Collectively, they’ve recorded well over 7,000 lifts totalling well over five million tonnes of sugar beet.

This has genuinely contributed to the relatively smooth running of our factory operations and helped to minimise disruption – particularly during recent cold and wet weather.

We need harvesters to keep using “Lifted” over the coming weeks, as this will help us to finalise the end dates for this Campaign.

We’ll be making further refinements to the app in readiness for the next Campaign, such as being able to drop clamps inside fields, and improving the refresh of field colours.

“Delivered” – call for feedback

Just as “Lifted” saw big upgrades this Campaign, we now want to make major improvements to “Delivered” in time for 2026/27 - so we need to hear from hauliers.

The web portal shares field maps and clamp locations, along with estimated tonnages from the harvester, and creates a digital record on a clamp has been cleared.

Hauliers wishing to share their feedback are encouraged to get in touch with their site intake contact.

“Loaded” pilot latest

A huge thanks to the hauliers and growers who’ve been at the forefront of our “Loaded” pilot this Campaign.

This new system uses Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) tags to link beet deliveries back to the clamp and field(s) they came from, giving growers better insight on crop performance.

Once refined, this will give growers better quality information about their crop, offering valuable data including yield and sugar content at field/block level.

In future it also has the potential to aid campaign logistics through more effective management of clamps and beet supply.

In an exciting first for our industry, this pilot has proven that the concept works and shows real promise.

We look forward to continuing to work with our hauliers and growers to make improvements to the system’s reliability ahead of the 2026/27 Campaign.