President’s Message – March 2018

As I write this message the temperature outside has suddenly risen, the sun has even poked its head through the clouds and it feels as if Spring may finally be on the way. It’s been a long winter and many will have had work frustrated by the weather recently, so I hope that forecasts this week of a third ‘Beast from the East’ are very much exaggerated! At least that harbinger of Spring, The Masters, is only a few days away, and that is enough to warm the coldest of golfing hearts.

I realise that it has been some time since my last message and I thought that, in the lead up to our annual meeting, it was a good time to update you all on what has been going on within the EIGCA.

First of all I am delighted to announce that we have two new Bronze Partners, Bernhard and Profusion. Bernhard will be known to some of you as the company that provides grinders to many of the world’s top golf courses. They also supply SubAir and TurfBreeze systems, two new areas of technology which are helping to promote healthier turfgrass through improved subsurface aeration and moisture removal. Bernhard’s Jonathan Pendry will be joining us in Bruges and will also be speaking to us at our conference about the some of the science behind the recent redevelopment work at Wentworth.

Profusion is the developer of Blinder bunker liner, the popular rubber granular based lining system. Profusions Nigel Wyatt will be a familiar name to many of our members and I am sure he is looking forward to catching up with many old friends again within the EIGCA.

I want to reiterate to everyone how important our Partners are to us. Their support will allow us, not only to provide better services to you as members, but also to deliver our aim of reducing subscription fees. I realise that I risk sounding like a broken record by repeating this, but it is so important that we all support our Partners whenever possible. Please include them on your tender lists so they at least have the opportunity to be involved in your projects. We are always on the lookout for articles to illustrate where our members and Partners are working together so don’t be surprised if you are contacted by Lindsey chasing up news items and stories for our next Ezine. As a reminder I have listed all EIGCA’s Partners below;

Gold Partners

• Rain Bird
• Toro

Silver Partners

• Better Billy Bunker
• John Deere
• Ransomes Jacobsen

Bronze Partners

Asian Golf Construction	Atlantic Golf Construction	Benedetti – Guelpa Golf International
Bernhard	Capillary Concrete	CMF Global, Inc.
EcoBunker	Golfgraffix	Greenmakers by Nelson & Vecchio
Hunter Industries	John Greasley	Josef Pötter-Golf
MJ Abbott	Perrot	Profile Products
ProFusion	Progolf	Semillas Fito
Sol Golf

We are always on the lookout for new Partners so if you know of companies which might be interested in joining our partnership programme then please let us know.

One important area where our Partners and Patrons have come together to help us is with the development of our CPD Programme. Our thanks must go to BIGGA for their assistance in setting up and administering our online points system and to Rain Bird and John Deere for their support. If you have not done so already I urge you to visit the Members Area of the EIGCA website, log in and visit the CPD site. Here you can claim credits which will put you on the road to becoming CPD Approved.

If you attended last year’s annual meeting you may be surprised as to how many points you already have. The development of a proper CPD programme is a big step forward in our drive to provide education opportunities for the membership and to improve the recognition of the EIGCA as a professional representative organisation.

My congratulations go to Christoph Staedler and Ken Moodie who have become the first members to achieve Approved status.

An early highlight of 2018 was the EIGCA drinks reception during BTME at Harrogate. It was a great opportunity for members, Patrons, Partners and other guests to catch up with news and discuss prospective work for the forthcoming year. My thanks go to Tim Lobb, our Partner Liaison Officer, for organising the event.

Also at BTME Tim and James Edwards ran an education day for BIGGA members and students. This was organised as part of EIGCA’s reciprocal agreement with BIGGA in return for their involvement with our CPD programme. I know both Tim and James saw this as a good chance to both promote EIGCA and to meet so many course managers and greenkeepers and we will be looking for other volunteers to take the opportunity to become involved in the coming years.

On the subject of education I was delighted to hear about the success of the recent Toro Student Study Tour to the links courses of South-east England. Students from the previous intake of EIGCA’s Vocational Qualification course had to battle the ‘Beast from the East’, so conditions were not perhaps what they would have wanted, but I am very much looking forward to hearing more about their trip when they give a presentation during our annual conference in Bruges. Our thanks go to Toro, and particularly Andy Brown, for their continued support of our Students and the education programme.

In February I had the pleasure of attending the FEGGA Conference in Sofia. It was a good opportunity to cement relationships with both FEGGA and BIGGA as well as to meet others within the golf industry. The conference had a good cross section of speakers covering topics such as social media, education, sustainability, challenges facing the industry and more general issues around greenkeeping and agronomy. Perhaps the most entertaining and thought provoking presentation was a discussion on the future challenges which face the Industry and specifically how robotics will impact on golf course management. There was a degree of concern that robotic machines might lead to fewer staff being employed and ultimately less people coming into greenkeeping, making the job less attractive and potentially leading to a decline in training and expertise. Certainly some food for thought.

Many of you will be aware of the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) which will be coming into force on the 25th May 2018. It has been described as the most important change in data privacy regulation in the last 20 years. GDPR will impact on all organisations within the EU and will also apply to those outside the EU which offer services to EU data subjects. The EIGCA are currently carrying out a review with Lindsey Collumbell to ensure that we are compliant with the new regulations. We have also asked Lindsey to prepare guidance notes for all our members to ensure that you know how to ensure your own compliance.

Finally, I look forward to meeting up with as many as possible of you in Belgium next month. I’m sure it will be a great week. We will be visiting some fine golf courses and it looks like we will have an entertaining and varied line up of speakers for our conference. As most of you will know, Julia will unfortunately not be able to attend the annual meeting this year, and although she will be keeping us organised as best she can from afar, we may well be looking for volunteers during the week to help out with some logistics. Your Council have been given specific roles and I’m sure that they will be appreciative of any help you can provide if it is required.

I wish you all a very happy Easter.

Ross McMurray
EIGCA President