HAPPY New Year! After a rare week off from sourcing and supplying Oxford with local, ethical and delicious fresh fruit and veg I'm back behind the Cultivate VegVan wheel this week, rested and raring to go.

We're starting the year as we mean to go on and building on the progress we made in 2016.

I'm proud to say it was one of our most successful years to date and we sold more local food to more local people than ever before.

But, there's no easing in gently to 2017, we have a busy week ahead.

Jack, the other member of the Cultivate management team, is off to the Oxford Real Farming conference which, even though Cultivate don't grow their own veg anymore, is a great opportunity to come together with other sustainable and organic foodies and farmers.

I'm looking forward to hearing all about their discussions on the global food system, new farming techniques and to finding out what's coming out of the ground locally in the year ahead.

Meanwhile I'll be holding the fort at our regular stops and markets and launching our brand new stop in Botley outside SS Peter and Paul Church.

After a successful day at the Botley food fair back in September and following several customer requests, we were keen to bring our local, ethical and delicious fresh produce to the area.

Now, thanks to the community at SS Peter and Paul, who are kindly letting us use their space for the day, we'll be parking up outside the church every 1st and 3rd Saturday of the month 10am-2pm.

We've got loads of other exciting plans for the year ahead which will all be revealed in due course but around all the exciting new developments our core purpose remains the same: helping to create a better food system for the people of Oxford by bringing them local, ethical and delicious food via our markets, VegVan and wholesale outlets.

So whether your new years resolutions is to shop locally, reduce waste, eat more healthily and/ or sustainably my self and the Cultivate team are here in full force to help you out this year.