Jack Bosworth, FJ Bosworth & Sons. Published 1 October 2025.
Hope everyone is well.
In a previous piece I wrote about our application to the latest round of the Farming Equipment and Technology Fund (FETF), and our hope of securing funding for a robotic pressure washer. I am disappointed, and honestly a little surprised, to say that the application was unsuccessful.
Across two rounds of FETF, we have had funding awarded for several items. Of all of them, this is the one I genuinely believe would have delivered the most benefit across the most areas. Which is what makes the result so hard to square.
The scoring
Our application scored just 0.15. The minimum scoring threshold was 0.37. That is despite the robotic pressure washer being the sixth highest scoring item out of all the eligible pig-related items associated with the Animal Health and Welfare Pathway.
In other words, the equipment itself was rated very near the top of the list of priorities. Our application against that equipment came back well below the threshold. I would like to understand why, and we will be looking to find that out if we can.
What this machine would have done for the farm
Here is the case as I see it, laid out clearly.
Lower emissions
The robotic washer is battery powered. It would have run on electricity, much of which we generate ourselves through 100 kW of solar panels on the farm. The kit it would have replaced is a fleet of PTO-driven pressure washers, each one driven by a tractor running on red diesel. The carbon arithmetic on that swap is straightforward and substantial.
Lower water consumption
The washer follows a learned cleaning protocol for each building. That means less wastage, more accuracy and far better concentration on the areas that actually need it. With water becoming an increasingly serious conversation in agriculture, this matters.
Better staff working conditions
This is the one people sometimes underplay. Pressure washing pig housing is hard, wet, cold, repetitive work, and the first bit of any wash is by some margin the worst bit. The robot is capable of completing 90% of the job, and that 90% is exactly the part nobody wants to do. The team would be left doing the final detail work, which is the bit you actually want a person on.
More time for stockmanship
If the machine is doing the washing, the team is not. That freed-up time goes back into stockmanship. With the unit able to run the machine 24 hours a day, we would also get more drying time in our pig housing between batches, which is a direct biosecurity gain.
A subtle point on attention to detail
This is the bit I have thought about most. There is a principle that the less you have to do of something, the more carefully you do the bit that is left. If everyone on the team is only washing 10% of a building rather than 100%, my prediction would be that attention to detail on that remaining 10% would be even better than it is now. And our attention to detail at the moment is already very good. That improvement compounds straight back into animal health and welfare through better husbandry and a cleaner environment.
Where this leaves us
Add it all up. Lower emissions. Lower water use. Better working conditions. More time for stockmanship. More drying time for housing. Sharper attention to detail. That is the case I find difficult to reconcile with a score of 0.15.
We will try to understand the scoring if we can, because the feedback will be useful regardless of whether we re-apply. The wider point I would make is that schemes like FETF only work if applicants come away with a clear sense of why their applications scored the way they did. Otherwise, decisions like this one risk feeling arbitrary, and farmers stop putting the work in to apply.
The investment case for the machine has not changed. The funding route has, and we will think carefully about what to do next.
Jack Bosworth runs FJ Bosworth & Sons with his father Stuart at Spains Hall, Willingale, Essex. The family business has been farming pigs and arable since 1919, with a focus on home-grown feed, on-site solar-powered milling and farm-to-fork pork through Procters Sausages. FJ Bosworth & Sons is a Farmers Weekly award winner, a National Pig Awards Sustainable Farming Award winner (2024) and Red Tractor assured.
Fourth-generation farmer at Spains Hall, Willingale. Runs the contracting team and writes most of what appears here.