Business & Technology
£3million innovative farm which ‘suprised’ Jeremy Clarkson set to shut
The innovative farm, home to 28 Dutch Meuse-Rhine-Issel cows, was established in May 2019 by Peter and Minke van Wingerden in the Port of Rotterdam.
Jeremy Clarkson visited the farm last year on Clarkson’s Farm and demanded Britain builds floating farms across the country’s docks in a bid to protect the environment.
The ex-Top Gear presenter suggested the idea be taken up in cities such as London, Liverpool and Manchester.
He wrote in the Sunday Times after visiting: “I was there with Kaleb, who thought he knew all about cow farming. But he was stunned by this.
“Peter and his wife, Minke, have also opened a farm shop. It’s just like the one we have at Diddly Squat; he even has a neighbour who writes to the council every day urging them to close it down.
“I left the floating farm, genuinely surprised by the elegant simplicity of it all.”
Conceived as a futuristic solution for sustainable food production, the farm operates independently of traditional land-based farming, featuring on-site facilities for feeding, milking, slurry, and dairy production.
Despite its popularity and the interest it garnered from hundreds of thousands of visitors globally, the farm is now being sold due to running out of permission to stay in the port and what the owners describe as “ridiculous outdated demands”.
Owner Peter van Wingerden explained that the city and port’s plans to redevelop the area for residential housing were the initial reasons for the farm’s impending closure.
However, regulatory complications added to the decision to sell.
Around two years ago, the farm encountered issues with its specially designed low-emissions floor, which started to bulge, causing problems for both the cows and a robotic scraper.
The owners replaced it with another low-emissions floor made in Germany, which, despite the farm’s regular emissions monitoring showing compliance with optimum levels, was not certified in the Netherlands.
As a result, Rijnmond Environmental Service, known as DCMR, sanctioned the farm.
Despite the farm’s emissions remaining within permissible limits, the lack of certification for the new floor led to sanctions.
This prompted the owners to opt for selling the cows and the farm, which can be relocated globally.
Producing approximately 600 litres of milk daily, the farm’s high-protein, butterfat-rich milk is primarily processed into milk, yoghurt, and cheese.
The floating farm was not just a novelty but a pioneering initiative in sustainable urban farming, highlighting the potential for food production in non-traditional environments.
However, the closure underscores the challenges faced by such innovative ventures in navigating regulatory landscapes.
SOFIAH NICHOLE SALIVIO
News Editor
Urban Jungle has partnered with IKEA to launch home insurance for IKEA customers in the UK, marking IKEA’s first insurance partnership in the British market.
The range includes contents insurance, buildings insurance, and combined buildings and contents cover, with contents policies starting at £60 a year. Policies are available through IKEA’s website and price comparison sites, and customers can change or cancel cover without a fee.
The launch gives IKEA a new service category beyond home furnishings as retailers look for additional revenue streams and closer customer relationships. For Urban Jungle, the deal expands its white-label insurance model with a major consumer brand.
Contents cover offers protection of up to £120,000 and is aimed at renters, flatshares, students, and other households. Buildings insurance provides up to £1 million of cover as standard, with optional extras including accidental damage, home emergency, out-of-home cover, and legal expenses.
The companies are entering the market as underinsurance remains an issue in the UK, particularly among renters. Urban Jungle said only 57% of private renters currently have contents insurance.
Founded in 2016, Urban Jungle has served more than 300,000 customers in the UK across home and travel insurance. It sells directly to consumers and through partnerships with other brands.
Retail push
The agreement also broadens IKEA’s “life at home” services offer in the UK, which already includes home move and set-up services and a branded credit card. The insurance product is positioned as part of that wider push into services linked to household needs.
Insurance sold through retail and affinity partnerships has become a more established route to market for specialist providers, particularly in home, travel, and embedded finance products. These arrangements allow retailers to offer adjacent services without building their own regulated insurance operations from scratch.
Jimmy Williams, Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Urban Jungle, said the deal was a significant milestone for the company.
“We are delighted to partner with IKEA, and this marks a significant milestone in Urban Jungle’s mission. We believe in fair insurance for everyone, and by joining forces with IKEA, we can bring our technology-driven, AI-powered, accessible home insurance to an even wider audience. We are proud to be the first insurance provider to collaborate with IKEA in the UK, offering insurance that truly puts the customer first,” he said.
IKEA said the product forms part of its effort to support customers beyond furnishing purchases.
“IKEA’s mission is to create a better everyday life for the many people, and that extends to feeling secure and protected in your home. By partnering with Urban Jungle, we are bringing a simple, functional, and affordable home insurance product to our customers, ensuring they have peace of mind that their homes and belongings are protected. As part of our wider life at home services offer, this partnership helps us support customers beyond home furnishing, making everyday life at home a little easier,” said Callum Leavy, Country Customer Experience Manager, IKEA UK.
New store DartSmart set up shop in unit 14 of Templars Square Shopping Centre, Cowley, with a grand opening event on Saturday, August 1.
The small, family-run business has been launched by Dwaine Jackson, an avid player who wanted to create Oxfordshire’s ‘new home of darts’.
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He is supported by his wife, Jay, who helped setting up the store while on maternity leave with their nine-month-old son, from her job as a personal assistant.
Mr Jackson said: “I have a passion for darts and I play regularly in the local Oxford leagues, but I noticed I needed to travel out of Oxford for accessories, or order online with delivery costs and longer wait times.
“So, I wanted to bring an accessible darts shop central to Oxford and surrounding towns to fulfil the needs of the local dart players.”
DartSmart sells premium equipment and accessories for all levels, for beginners to professionals, stocking major brands.
It also offers a trade discount for pubs, clubs and league venues, to support the sport the owner loves so much, and has two dedicated oches so customers can try before they buy.
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A spokesperson for Templars Square Shopping Centre said: “Whether you’re inspired by world-class players like Luke Littler or picking up your first set of darts, DartSmart has everything you need to enjoy the game, from darts and dartboards to flights, shafts and cases.
“Pop in and give them a warm Templars Square welcome.”
DartSmart is open from Tuesday to Saturday, 10am to 6pm, and until 4pm on Sundays.
SOFIAH NICHOLE SALIVIO
News Editor
OneAdvanced has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Cosine to join the Lumen Sovereign Coalition, which is working on what the companies describe as Britain’s first fully sovereign frontier AI model.
The agreement brings OneAdvanced into a group of companies and institutions helping to shape the model for regulated and essential service sectors. Its role will include contributing use cases, operational requirements, testing scenarios and deployment feedback from industries where its software is already in use.
Those sectors include healthcare, government, justice, education, care and business services. OneAdvanced will use that experience to help define how the model should operate in settings where security, governance and operational rules can limit the use of foreign-hosted AI systems.
Cosine, a London-based AI laboratory, is developing the Lumen Sovereign model with support from a wider industry coalition. Other members include BAE Systems, Babcock International Group, BT, HSBC, Lloyds Banking Group, LSEG, NatWest Group, PwC, The Alan Turing Institute and Vodafone.
The project is backed by the UK Government’s Sovereign AI Programme, which has committed GBP £500 million. The model is due to be trained using the Isambard supercomputer in Bristol.
OneAdvanced’s involvement follows its work on a healthcare large language model developed with NVIDIA and trained on NHS primary care data. That system was designed to improve primary care triage, and the company is positioning it as evidence of its experience in applying AI to sector-specific operational needs.
In healthcare, OneAdvanced says its software supports more than 40 million NHS patients across NHS 111, GP practices and trusts. It also works across local government, education, legal services, transport and supply chains.
Sector input
The tie-up reflects a broader push in the UK technology sector to develop AI systems that can be hosted, trained and audited within the country. For organisations operating in heavily regulated environments, questions about where a model runs, what data it is trained on and who can review its operation have become increasingly important in procurement and deployment decisions.
Cosine says the coalition is intended to ensure the model is shaped by organisations that will use it in real operating environments, rather than by technical teams alone. That means feeding in practical constraints from sectors such as healthcare, local government and legal services.
Cosine framed that goal around control and auditability.
“We’re building Lumen Sovereign because we think the UK needs frontier AI it can actually control: where the model runs, what data trained it, who can audit it. That only works if we build it alongside the organisations running the country’s real, regulated infrastructure. OneAdvanced helps us achieve that goal. Their experience with the NHS, local government, education, and thousands of legal practices means they bring insights into the operational constraints a sovereign model needs to actually be useful,” said Alistair Pullen, Co-founder & Chief Executive Officer of Cosine.
Practical focus
For OneAdvanced, the move also underlines its argument that the next stage of AI adoption in critical services will depend less on general model performance claims and more on whether systems can fit existing workflows, governance standards and data-handling requirements.
The company has been advocating for AI systems designed around UK data residency and domestic control over infrastructure. Its software footprint in public and regulated services gives it a route into organisations that may be cautious about deploying overseas-hosted models in sensitive settings.
Simon Walsh set out that position in his remarks on the coalition agreement.
“We have long advocated sovereign AI as the safest and most secure way for UK organisations to leverage the transformative power of AI in their flow of work. Through our work with NVIDIA to develop the UK’s first sovereign healthcare large language model, trained on NHS primary care data to improve patient triage outcomes, we have seen first-hand the importance of combining advanced technology with deep sector knowledge, robust governance and a clear understanding of the workflows organisations rely on every day. That is why we are delighted to join the Lumen Sovereign coalition.
“Organisations in the UK’s highly regulated and essential service sectors need AI that is not only powerful, but secure, trusted and designed around the realities of the environments in which it will operate. We look forward to working with Cosine and the wider coalition to help turn that ambition into practical capability,” said Walsh.
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