The spirit of European collaboration was evident as a growing seed company unveiled its new north Norfolk headquarters.

Solana Seeds UK celebrated its first birthday with a special event to formally open its new integrated office and laboratory facilities in a former wine cellar at Stody Hall Barns, near Melton Constable.

Representatives from the firm's German parent company joined visitors from partners in Poland, Ukraine and Ireland to view the equipment which will be used for analysis of trial samples to assess boiling quality, skin finish, bruising, colour and yield of potato varieties.

The company is an independent subsidiary of the Solana Group, based in Hamburg, which had been marketing its potato seed stock in Britain since 2013.

The market was developing quickly enough to prompt the formation of a dedicated company last July. Solana Seeds has already extended its production area to 135 hectares across the UK and Ireland, and offers a full agronomy service to its growers.

Craig Stephen, commercial director of Solana Seeds UK said: 'We are developing as a company. We do trial sites so we can establish what the German and the Dutch varieties will do in East Anglia and beyond. For all our trials this year, everything will be sorted on site to work out yields, the dry matter, the tuber count, and any diseases. It makes us a bit different. Most other businesses will look at procuring the seed but we take it to the next step. It is important for us to know if a variety is going to do something before we commit the growers to growing it.'

Following the Brexit referendum vote, Charlie MacNicol, of landlord the Stody Estate, welcomed the European contingent by saying: 'It is in times like these we need to show our friends in Europe that we live in a collaborative world, rather than pulling up the drawbridge'