The Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board Order 2007

PART 4 Horticulture

Levy on horticultural products

14.  Any person must pay a levy if he—

(a) grows horticultural products specified in the table below;

(b) sells those products grown by him, or anything derived from such products grown by him, and

(c) has adjusted sales figures (as calculated in accordance with paragraph 18) from those products or derivatives in any year ending 31st March of £60,000 or more.

Horticultural products

Vegetables grown in the open 1  All vegetables grown in the open and sold for human consumption, including watercress but excluding potatoes. Fruit 2  All soft fruit and orchard fruit, including nuts but excluding— varieties of apples certified as cider apples, and varieties of pears certified as perry pears, by the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board; hops; and grapes. Flowers and bulbs 3  All flowers (whether cut or in pot), foliage, flower bulbs, corms, tubers and rhizomes. Hardy and other nursery stock 4.1  All hardy nursery stock including— fruit trees, bushes and canes, strawberries for runner production and other fruit stock for transplanting; roses (including stock for budding); shrubs and hedging plants; ornamental trees and trees for sale for amenity purposes; perennial herbaceous plants; and aquatic plants. 4.2  All other nursery stock, seedlings and cuttings for propagation. Protected crops 5  All crops grown in glasshouses and other forms of protection including pot plants, bedding plants and plants being propagated for growing elsewhere. Herbs 6  All species of herbs.

Levy on mushroom spawn

15.  Any person must pay a levy if, in any year ending 31st March, he—

(a) buys more than 700 litres of mushroom spawn, or

(b) buys compost containing more than 700 litres of mushroom spawn.

Returns

16.—(1) On or before 30th June each year any person liable to pay levy under this Part must, using the form published by the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board for the purpose, provide sufficient information to enable the Board to calculate the levy due for the year ending 31st March that year.

(2) The information must be certified by an accountant unless the Board has notified the person that this is not necessary and for these purposes an accountant is a person who is a fully-qualified member of one of the bodies constituting the Consultative Committee of Accountancy Bodies (in the United Kingdom or Ireland) or who holds an equivalent qualification in another member State.

(3) Failure to comply with this paragraph is an offence.

Information notices

17.—(1) If the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board believes on reasonable grounds that any person is liable to pay levy under this Part, and that person has not submitted a return under this Part, the Board may serve a notice on that person requiring him, within a time specified in the notice, to provide sufficient information concerning any horticultural business operated by that person to enable the Board to assess whether levy is payable and, if it is payable, the amount.

(2) It is an offence to fail to comply with such a notice.

Maximum levy for horticultural products

18.—(1) In the case of horticultural products the levy is based on the sales made during the accounting year of the grower that ended in the year ending 31st March, and the maximum levy is 0.6% of the adjusted sales figure.

(2) The adjusted sales figure is—

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where—

• £AS = the adjusted sales figure

• W = wholesale sales

• R = retail sales

• P = the cost of packing materials

• T = the cost incurred by the grower in transporting the materials or derivatives from his premises to his customer

• B = the purchase cost of products that are bought in to be grown on and re-sold

• Pr = the cost of the following processing procedures: canning, freezing, drying, juicing, or extracting or any similar process that substantially alters the raw product.

Maximum levy for mushrooms

19.  In the case of mushrooms the levy is based on the amount of mushroom spawn used or sold in the year ending 31st March, and the maximum levy is 20 pence per litre of spawn used or sold for agaricus spawn and 8 pence per litre for non-agaricus spawn.

Payment

20.  The levy under this Part is payable on invoice.