The National Farmers’ Union (NFU) has revealed the identity of its new regional director for East Anglia.

Robert Sheasby is preparing from a different landscape and different challenges as he looks forward to moving to the region from the North West where he has been the NFU’s regional director for the past five years.

Mr Sheasby, who is due to take up his new post from June 1, has worked for the NFU for 14 years, firstly as the organisation’s livestock schemes adviser and then as its rural surveyor before moving to the North West as regional director in December 2009.

“This is an exciting opportunity for me to represent farmers in a different part of the country and to take forward some of the work we’ve been doing in the North West into East Anglia,” he said.

“I am looking forward to meeting as many members as possible and getting a real feel for their needs and how they believe the NFU can best support their business.”

Mr Sheasby is a graduate of Seale-Hayne Agricultural College, where he studied rural estate management. He spent the early part of his career working as a land agent in the South West of England.

He then moved to the Thames Valley, where he worked as a tenant’s agent and auctioneer at Reading Cattle Market, before joining the NFU in 2001.

He added: “I firmly believe in an agricultural industry that’s profitable in its own right, but we have a long way to go to reach that goal. At the moment our self-sufficiency in food is only 60% and it is going down. It’s the NFU’s ambition to reverse that trend and East Anglia, with its productive farmland, will have a leading role to play if we’re to achieve that.”

Mr Sheasby, who is married with two daughters, succeeds Pamela Forbes, who is moving to a new role as the NFU’s chief sugar adviser.