An Ely manufacturer scooped the top award for innovation at a regional agricultural show for its cutting-edge machine design.

The Side Ridge Injection system machine, developed by Target Set Technology, part of Standen Engineering, based on Station Road, took home the number one prize at the LAMMA agricultural show for its machine designed to improve the productivity of potato operations.

The groundbreaking system injects fertiliser and pest control agents directly into the part of the soil - bringing a bigger benefit to the growing plants.

It won the Farm Machinery and Equipment Innovation Award category, and the overall award for Best Product or Innovation at LAMMA show 2016.

General manager Charlie Baker said: “I am very pleased, but a bit shocked. We were not expecting to get the second trophy.

“People are coming on to the stand and they recognise we have won the award, which has to be good for us. Hopefully it will give people confidence in the machine. It is quite a different thing to bring to the market, so this should give them confidence that it will work.

“There is nothing out there as far as we are concerned that does anything like this. The benefit of the machine is we can put the product in the right zone when the crop is growing. The farmer can potentially cut their fertiliser rate back, so that will save them costs. There are new products coming onto the market to replace nematicides and these products can only be put on with this machine, because they need to go into the crop as it is growing.”

Target Set Technology was one of 900 exhibitors at the two-day event which brought thousands of farmers to the East of England Showground in Peterborough.