Research is vital – but sometimes it has already been done, farmers reminded

Published on Thursday 19 November 2009 21:55

AS the world comes to grips with having more and more mouths to feed, the focus moves to the need for increased agricultural research.

This week, the retiring head of research at the Scottish Agricultural College, Professor John Oldham, called for what he termed re-research, or digging up old research papers on work that had already been carried out but had then been left to gather dust on a shelf.

One example he gave at the SAC Council meeting in Edinburgh, which endorsed the body's annual report, related to greenhouse gas emissions.

"Oskar Kellner was measuring methane production from dairy cows in 1909," Prof Oldham said.

"As recently as 25 years ago we had some of the world's best facilities for measuring such emissions at the Hannah and the Rowett Research Institutes but we got rid of them and we are now having to rebuild."

He said he was confident that ways would be found to solve the problems. "The target of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 80 per cent by 2050 gives us only 40 years. That is about the same span as my career.

"It is sobering to think that we have so much to achieve in only one working life."

He recalled that when he started out in the early 1970s it was the time of the "Food From Our Own Resources" policy "but that sort of thinking was soon swept under the carpet and has stayed there until now".

Speaking at the same event, Lord Selborne, who is a past president of the parliamentary science committee, agreed that a great deal of scientific momentum had been lost in the past three decades.

He recalled ruefully his days as chairman of the Agricultural and Food Research Council during Margaret Thatcher's time as prime minister, when he had been forced, very much against his will, to "close institute after institute". "Agricultural research lost its way after that and I particularly regret the loss of Adas as an extension service," he said.

Lord Selborne noted that although the scientific base had been largely dismantled Scotland had not suffered as badly as the rest of the UK and was starting this new phase from a high base.

He called the Scottish Government's world-leading targets for reducing greenhouse gases "heroic" and like Prof Oldham believed they could be met if the mechanisms existed to deliver the science. However, Prof Oldham point-ed to a paradox between the scientific output in Scotland and the uptake of new ideas. He said independent figures showed that in terms of citations per scientific paper Scotland was at the top of a table of 20 major agricultural countries, with New Zealand at the bottom and England and the US in the middle ground.

But when it came to the annual percentage improvement in agricultural GDP, the position was almost exactly reversed.

"If we in Scotland were really making the best of our science we would be at the top. We need to match scientific excellence with practical outcomes. It is clear that research delivery is the keystone to keeping the structure intact. Otherwise it is likely to become nothing more than a pile of rubble."

Perhaps the whole translation of research into reality may be moving on to a different plane. The college's chief executive, Professor Bill McKelvey, highlighted in his report the fact that turnover in commissioned research and consultancy had doubled in the past 12 months from 3.5 million to 7m, with much of the increase devoted to climate change programmes.