XtraBlatt Issue 02-2020

TITLE THEME
BIOHOF KINKELBUR
ICE AND EGGS
SELL WELL
Milk, ices, eggs, potatoes – and beef too. These are the
main products sold in the Kinkelbur family’s farm shop.
The Kinkelburs have been dedicated to organic production
for almost 40 years now, and have a farm business
to be proud of.
A
crowing cockerel on a dung heap surrounded by deep,
muddy puddles? Perhaps partly due to old-fashioned
images in children’s books this, or something like it, is what
springs to mind for many as the typical organic farmyard.
But does “bio” farming really have to look like this? Not at
all!
Quite the opposite, in fact, is to be seen on the Kinkelbur
family’s Bioland farm at Minden-Haddenhausen in the
German state of North Rhine-Westphalia. A large herd of
black and white dairy cows loose housed in a cubicle barn,
and 350 laying hens in mobile accommodation (the “henmobile”)
are all kept in a neat and tidy farm business that’s
grown steadily over the years. It’s beautiful there. In fact,
very beautiful! Nestling idyllically under the Kaiser Wilhelm
Memorial at Porta Westfalica near Schloss Haddenhausen,
the Kinkelbur farm attracts crowds of customers to its
seven-days-a-week farm shop.
On our visit, we joined a busy throng in the yard. Farm
workers, potato buyers, shoppers with questions to ask,
a vet and someone delivering animal feed. All vied for
attention – and always in the centre of the turmoil, farmer
Friedrich Kinkelbur, energetically helping and organising.
The 51-year-old is organic farmer through and through.
He’s convinced that the bio way is the right way. His father
changed to organic management as early as 1981, so that
much of the land has been organically farmed for almost 40
years now, with not a single drop of plant protection spray
or spot of mineral N fertiliser applied in that time. The farm
has grown steadily. Fields are continually added, there’s been
renovation and rebuilding. A neighbouring farm has been
rented and this is where the herd followers are kept. “When
a farm expands, new colleagues are needed that can think
for themselves, work well and be self-reliant, ever ready to
inject their ideas into the business. And this is the kind of
staff we have”, emphasises the farmer.
FARM-MADE ICE CREAMS
The farm shop has been open since spring 2020. Available
there are home-grown potatoes as well as eggs, milk and
beef. Friedrich Kinkelbur explains that regionality is a major
aim with the food he sells. “Our cattle are slaughtered
nearby by a family firm.” There, the carcasses are jointed
by skilled butchers. The proportion of saleable cuts per
carcass is high. Each customer can order a box. And the
box is delivered with everything that’s available: filet and
roastbeef, roasting cuts, ready-cut beef casserole slices, soup
meat, ossobuco, bones, goulash and mince.
The Kinkelbur organic farm started
direct marketing in spring 2020 with the
establishment of its first “henmobile”.
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