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]]>According to DECC’s Low Carbon Transition plan (2009), UK agriculture produces 7% of the UK’s carbon emissions, with livestock production responsible for an estimated 5%. A publication from the United Nations (FAO, Tackling climate change through livestock – 2013) suggested global emissions from livestock made up around 14.5% of all carbon emissions.
But red meat is here to stay: trends show rises in consumption in developed countries, and there is a correlation between meat consumption and prosperity in developing countries. This is an illustration of the sort of challenges in food production that science is trying to address.
I visited the farm recently as part of the Agri-Innovation Conference that took place at the end of February in York. Givendale farm looks pretty much the same as any other East Yorkshire cattle farm, but it hosts a ground-breaking test facility ( the feed evaluation unit) to measure individual feed intake and live weight gain in young breeding Stabiliser bull and steers. The Stabiliser breed is a hybrid of traditional British and maternal Continental breeds whose attributes of includes calving ease, good fertility and high eating quality beef. At the unit, each individual meal is recorded for each individual animal for a period of 12 weeks. All data is sent through a wireless link from feed bunker panels in the unit to a computer in a nearby office. Analysis of dataset derives NFE values for individual animals that allow a selection of future breeding stock. The feed evaluation unit houses 80 animals for each test batch and has 3 batches per year. Over 1,000 breeding Stabiliser breed bulls and steers have been assessed during the 5 year grant period between 2011 and 2016.
Initial results are promising: £23/head feed cost saving has been found over a 12 week feeding period between the average of most efficient third and the average of least efficient beef cattle. Low NFE beef cattle ( those in the most efficient third) produced around 15% less methane emissions than the high NFE cattle and this was achieved without changes in animals’ performance and the quality of the beef produced. And the NFE trait is 34% heritable so cattle selected for NFE will breed more efficient cattle. A win-win for farmers and the environment!
If you want to know more about this project visit www.bigbeef.co.uk
The Stabiliser pedigree standards include quality control such as meeting traceability, animal welfare and environmental management.
]]>If you read our blog post "Everyday Agri-tech", you'll know that research on cocoa is very important for your chocolatey mid-morning snack. A chocolate bar is a good way to see how important agriculture around the world is to us in the UK. Take a Kit Kat: it contains cocoa from Africa, milk products from the UK and New Zealand, palm oil from Asia, sugar from South America and wheat from Europe. This shows how interconnected agriculture and food systems are.
UK food security is dependent on food production around the world as we import over 39% of our food, although this figure falls to 25% for food that we can grow in the UK. Next time you’re in the supermarket, look at where your fruit comes from. You could find that your oranges have come from South Africa and your grapes from India.
At the Department for International Development we invest in agricultural research to support food security and economic development in developing countries and there are excellent opportunities for UK academics and companies to contribute to economic development and global food security.
Round 6 of the Agri-Tech Catalyst targets funding at academic/business collaborations to generate new innovations for developing country agriculture. The Catalyst is a great example targeted development funding that can deliver benefits for agriculture in developing countries and for the UK, whether for consumers or companies. Not only are we supporting farmers and companies who supply food to the UK, but through this support individuals and companies in developing countries are able to increase their incomes, build their capacity and contribute to the development of their agriculture sector.
Round 6 of the Agri-Tech Catalyst is now open for applications and unlike earlier rounds, this time it’s focusing exclusively on international development relevant projects. In previous rounds we’ve seen a wide range of applications covering everything from salinity sensors for shrimp farmers in Bangladesh, to biopesticides from fungi, to new wheat varieties resistant to aphids.
The diversity of applications shows how diverse the work of agriculture is. If you have an innovation which you think has the potential to benefit agriculture in developing countries I encourage you to apply. You can get support to develop you application from the Knowledge Transfer Network.
The Catalyst is one of a number of programmes we support to get agricultural innovation to farmers in developing countries. Others include AgResults, the African Agricultural Technology Foundation, the Global Alliance for Livestock Veterinary Medicines and Harvest Plus.
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]]>A quick Google search returned some amazing results which really opened my eyes to how advanced and varied agri-tech really is. From robotics to improving crop yields, there were pages and pages of “techy” science all relating to agriculture which I had absolutely no idea about. I mean... why would the ordinary person know about all these various wonderful projects.
So it got me thinking; how much does agri-tech play a part in our everyday lives without many of us even realising it?
When I’m having my healthy breakfast - porridge with honey - I wouldn’t think about the processes and the technology that goes along with it. However, you would be surprised as to the depth of research that goes into ensuring that our food is safe to eat and as efficiently produced as possible.
Since joining the team, I have learnt that the UK Agri-tech Strategy has so far supported around 120 Agri-tech Catalyst projects.
These can relate to:
The funded projects so far have ranged from harnessing friendly fungi to protect grain from insect pests, to ensuring better animal welfare for chickens, and everything in between! The Agri-tech Catalyst is currently open for applications and you can find out more information about this opportunity here.
So, when eating my morning snack of chocolate, the thought of the Agri-tech Catalyst projects does now spring to mind. Without cocoa there is no chocolate and without the next farming generation, there is no cocoa. Could you imagine that? Well worry not, as one of the recently funded Catalyst projects is aiming to help ensure the future of the supply chain of cocoa by leading a project to transform the way that cocoa is grown. There is also a project which aims to protect the UK cocoa supply by developing a diagnostic test for Cacao Swollen Shoot Virus – the main disease responsible for declining cocoa yields. You can see a schematic of the project below:
Now there’s some food for thought! Perhaps we should all be thinking more about the way that agri-tech plays its part in our everyday lives.
]]>Recognised for its world class science, the UK has the capacity to take a leading role to address world hunger. Recently published data found that UK Government expenditure on agri-tech R&D was about £320 million in 2012/13. Think it is a drop in the ocean? Think again.
It was British public research that improved food security and financial stability for some 2 to 3 million people in India, thanks to a newly-developed variety of pearl millet resistant to downy mildew, a disease that can cause up to one third of the crop to be lost. The new variety also produces up to 10% higher yields and matures early allowing multiple crops to be grown on the same land annually. New British-developed vaccinations were at the heart of eradicating rindepest globally, reducing starvation and increasing agricultural production throughout the developing world. The disease could claim mortality rates of more than 80% in cattle.
Producing more food is one side of the coin, the other is sustainability. If the food system is to adapt and contribute to mitigate climate change, it must use scarce natural resources sustainably. One of the most precious natural resources is water. 70% of the world’s fresh water for human use is dedicated to agriculture. Developed in the UK, partial root drying is a technique that has achieved to produce the same yield (or nearly the same) for certain crops, from tomatoes to cotton, with up to half the amount of water. Currently used in China, it promises great benefits for countries predisposed to drought.
Of the £320 million public funding in agri-tech research, the 2012/13 dataset showed that the highest proportion of R&D spend was on crops (£80 million) followed by livestock (£75 million). This reflects the importance of these sectors to agriculture in the UK. For example, wheat production is worth around £2 billion to the economy and the market value of beef and veal production was £2.8 billion in 2012. This couldn’t be achieved without agricultural innovation. British world leading research in wheat genetics has led the creation of new wheat varieties that produce higher yields. Genetic improvement is behind an increase of 0.05 tonne per hectare in the UK since the 1990s. With a yield of 8 tonnes per hectare (versus an average yield of 2.8 tonnes globally), the UK is among the international leaders in wheat production. Livestock research into a new diagnostic system to detect a European strain of the bluetongue virus helped prevent an outbreak of the disease in 2007, saving an estimated £480 million to the British economy and 10,000 jobs.
Turning now to private R&D spend, the 2012/13 dataset found that UK private investment in agri-tech was around £500 million, a good indicator of a vibrant and highly-innovative UK sector. This is good news all around.
The UK has proven ability to develop, with commercial partners, new products and solutions for the food and farming market. The UK agri-tech sector contributes £14.3 billion to the British economy, employing over half a million people. Working in partnership, PepsiCo UK and Cambridge University developed i-crop™, a web-based crop management system which brings together data drawn from soil moisture to assist farmers to make informed decisions about water irrigation. Collaboration between British universities and industry led to creation of a natural savoury flavour for vegetables, noodles and crisps that can be used instead of its chemically-created version, methyl mercaptan. Developed over two decades in British labs, the Benefortè broccoli contains 2-3 times more glucoraphanin than the traditional variety. Glucoraphanin believed to help maintain cardiovascular health and reduce the risk of cancer. The list goes on.
And that’s not all. Not included in the 2012/13 dataset, Government is spending a further £70 million on the Agri-Tech Catalyst and £80 million to establish world class Centres for Agricultural Innovation. To be co-invested with industry, the Catalyst supports collaborative R&D projects to take agricultural innovations from the laboratory to the marketplace. The Centres will support the wide scale adoption of innovation and technology, developing skills and capability in the food and farming supply chain.
Together the Centres, R&D agri-tech investment, world class agri-food science, and industry partnerships with the UK science base will turn ideas into successful agri-food solutions. So watch this space for the ground-breaking agri-tech developments to come.
]]>The Office for National Statistics collects data on key economic indicators, such as gross value added (a measure of economic output), employment and trade. Often this can be broken down at a detailed sector level. However, the data is not as well suited to capturing the economic contribution of emerging sectors, or of companies that span multiple sectors of the economy. Therefore, we commissioned a comprehensive study to assess the economic contribution of the agri-tech sector and how it is expected to perform in the future. This report also provides a solid foundation and evidence base which will be incredibly valuable in evaluating the success of the Agri-tech Strategy in the future.
Here are the key points:
In 2013 (the latest year for which data was available), the agri-tech sector contributed £14.3 billion to UK Gross Value Added and employed over half a million people. Agri-tech output grew by 16% between 2008 and 2013, however, this masks the rapid growth of some sub-sectors over the period. The animal sub-sector, environment and physical sub-sector, and ICT and decision support sector have all grown at more than 20%.
Traditional agriculture dominates the sector, but emerging technologies such as unmanned aerial systems, diagnostic tools to identify endemic diseases in livestock, and big data to help farmers work out what to plant, where and when; already accounts for a third of agri-tech output. Given increased interest in the sector, growing private and public sector investment in agricultural technologies, and improved infrastructure to support collaboration, the report forecasts that the technology component will account for a growing share of agri-tech output between now and 2030.
One of the fastest growing agri-tech subsectors is expected to be precision farming and engineering. It’s already worth over £1 billion to the UK economy and employs 21,000 people. Agricultural robotics are now being developed to drive tractors, kill weeds with lasers to avoid using chemicals, pick and grade strawberries , mow grass, scout for pests, weeds and diseases and plant seeds. This new wave of smart machines will revolutionise the way in which crops are grown in the future by using intelligently targeted inputs. Hi-tech areas like this are expected to expand as the core agriculture sector continues to seek efficiency improvements and adopts new technologies. The UK’s limited land supply and growing environmental and climate change challenges highlight a continuous need to improve efficiency in agriculture, driving the implementation of innovative farming practices, and investment in cutting-edge technologies.
The new report goes further than just assessing the size of the sector and its growth prospects. It also sets out a robust monitoring and evaluation plan to help Government monitor the implementation of the Agri-tech Strategy and measure its success in the future. The plan is wide-ranging, cutting across all the actions set out in the Strategy, including: the Agri-tech Catalyst, Centres for Agricultural Innovation, trade, inward investment, collaboration, skills and also the role of the Leadership Council in raising the profile of UK agri-tech both here and overseas. The monitoring and evaluation activity will enable us to find out how successful the Strategy has been and answer questions such as “by how much the sector has grown?” and “what’s driven this growth?” Not only is this information interesting, it will enable future government policies and strategies to be even better.
]]>JIC is an international centre of excellence for plant science and microbiology, funded predominantly by BIS through the BBSRC. There are about 50 different labs here, each headed by a senior scientist. We work to understand the basic biology of plants and microbes and how they interact with the environment. We use our discoveries for the benefit of agriculture and human health.
We work with plant breeders in developing traits – crop characteristics – that essentially increases the amount and quality of food that we produce. We currently have a global population of 7 billion people, which is expected to rise to 9 billion by 2050. We can’t take it for granted that the world will be able to produce enough food. Our scientists are working with the agri-tech community to develop new crops, such as new varieties of wheat, which produce more grain, which are more resistant to disease and climate change, and which have more nutrients in them. We have lots of international links, particularly with China, sub-Saharan Africa and India which helps us to get the knowledge generated by our research to some of the countries where it is most needed.
Yes, we have the Germplasm Resources Unit here at the John Innes Centre. This contains thousands of seeds from different lines of wheat, barley, peas and other crop plants. One of the collections is the “Watkins Wheat Collection”, named after a researcher who, in the 1920s, wrote to British Consulates around the world to ask for samples of wheat typical of the local area. The result is a collection of some 1,200 lines from 33 countries – so, this means that we have seeds adapted to all sorts of different growing conditions. Modern plant breeding has resulted in new varieties which have positive traits such as high yield and higher protein content, but in doing so we have bred out some traits which may be useful for today’s demands. The Watkins Wheat Collection has lines which are adapted to a range of environmental temperatures, altitudes, diseases – if we can understand what makes those lines resilient to different conditions we can work with the agri-tech community to breed those traits into new varieties for future challenges.
Land availability is always going to be a limiting factor, so if we are able to produce enough food for 9bn people we need to be able to increase the amount of food per hectare. JIC is addressing this in a number of ways – for example, we have programmes of research which are looking at how wheat grains could be larger and more numerous on a wheat ear. We are also looking to increase agricultural yields through identifying genes associated with disease resistance, and the mechanisms by which a plant could become diseased. Similarly, water availability is a challenge that the whole world is facing - even the UK can be limited in the wheat-growing season! So, with global environmental change, we need to develop crops which can withstand heat and drought.
New breeding techniques, such as genome editing and synthetic biology, have enormous potential for transforming our ability to feed the planet and reducing the environmental impact of agriculture. However, the complex regulatory landscape and public perception of these techniques is holding back industry’s ability to make best use of these. If the UK is to truly benefit further from the fantastic bioscience here, dialogue with the general public will be essential.
In the UK, there is ambition to achieve 20 tonnes per hectare. Typically, yields are about 9 tonnes per hectare but there is a wide variation across the country. Farmers have achieved 16 tonnes per hectare but this is at the current upper end. There is a balance between yield and inputs, with the greater yields arising with most effective use of fertiliser and water. Yields in the UK plateaued a decade ago, indicating that the inputs are already at the optimal levels. We need to turn to science to develop new crops which will achieve more with the same, or less, level of input.
I’d like to highlight one research project here at JIC which is using a synthetic biology approach. Peas and beans have a relationship with beneficial bacteria, which sees them trap nitrogen from the air – if we can understand the complex relationship and develop this for cereals crops like wheat and maize then we would not need to add artificial fertiliser to the crop. This is a long term and ambitious project at JIC, and one with a significant potential for the world – especially in sub-Saharan Africa where most smallholder farmers do not even have access to artificial fertilisers.
Absolutely. As well as our work in crop research, we also have scientific programmes in antibiotic discovery and vaccine production. We are currently building a new company from JIC science called Leaf Systems, which uses plants as mini factories to ‘make’ large quantities of proteins. This JIC technology is already being used in the US and Canada to make doses of vaccines in a far quicker and efficient way than other methods.
So as you see JIC has a much wider range of science programs than I certainly thought before I visited. Things have really moved on from the days of civil servants in far flung lands collecting seeds for researchers back home, although our modern day equivalent is our Science and Innovation Network which is a more strategic version comprising 90 staff, based in 28 countries and 47 cities around the world. The drive to exploit the technologies developed at JIC to produce other new materials really shows the versatility of the bioeconomy and for me shows how blue skies research can lead in very unexpected (and potentially lucrative) directions.
]]>Drones and satellites aren’t actually useful on their own. Their usefulness for farmers comes from what it attached – a sensor, camera, or even a crop sprayer – meaning applications are extensive and continuously expanding. Just a few of the current uses include:
The use of drones in farming has even featured the BBC's The One Show recently – it is still available on iPlayer here – and it nicely summarises the technology and highlights the potential benefits to farmers.
The Agri-tech Catalyst has funded a project led by PepsiCo – makers of Quaker Oats – which aims to provide UK oat producers with world leading agronomic ‘tools’. The project will develop tools that will turn data from drones into data measurements to enable growers to optimise yield and quality across fields. The measurements can then be fed into an Oat Crop Model that can act as a guide for growers to decide what will achieve the best results for their crop. These innovative tools could increase average yields by at least 1 tonne per hectare (approximately a £15 million uplift per annum in output from the existing oat land base), whilst contributing to sustainable intensification, and reducing imports.
The Satellite Applications Catapult has also picked up on the potential of this technology in the agriculture sector. Recently the Satellite Applications Catapult has been looking the potential applications of radar (more specifically Synthetic Aperture Radar) in the cloudy temperate zones of the Earth like those found in the UK. To illustrate how successful commercial services can be developed using the Sentinel 1 satellite data the Satellite Applications Catapult first undertook an Agri-tech Catalyst project with AgSpace to understand the feasibility of using Sentinel 1 radar data to monitor crop growth. The project was successful and has now been followed up with a European Space Agency funded project, again led by AgSpace, to test and demonstrate the service, with an aim to make it commercially available to all farmers by the end of 2017.
We are only at the start of unlocking the potential of drones and satellites in agriculture. The new Agri-EPI Centre, alongside the Satellite Applications Catapult, will no doubt play vital part in helping UK business exploit the potential of this exciting area. I can’t wait to see the changes this new technology brings to agriculture over the coming years, but let’s hope the nursery rhymes and Christmas carols are left as they are!
]]>During the Expo the UK Science and Innovation Network and UKTI put on a number of agri-tech events ranging from satellite applications in agriculture to the potential impact of climate change on the food supply. The report published last week captures all this activity, summarises what happened as a result of the event, and has some useful statistics too.
The other reason I was in Milan was to talk about the UK Agri-tech Strategy. It was an interactive Q&A style session with an interested audience of Italian agri-tech businesses, academics and officials. I thoroughly enjoyed discussing our work and the audience seemed impressed with what the UK had achieved in a short space of time; particularly the diversity and potential of Agri-tech Catalyst projects, and the recently announced Centres for Agricultural Innovation. One of the companies I met had already started preliminary discussions with Agrimetrics about a potential project, something I was delighted to hear. The event was held at the Copernico, a sort of business incubation hub with a bar and social space. What I found different about this incubation hub was that large multinationals were also part of it, and had taken significant space in the building – partly to help the small companies but also to exchange ideas.
Before I got my flight home I stopped off at the impressive Duomo di Milano (or Milan Cathedral), which had beautiful architecture and huge stained glass windows. I’d recommend climbing all the way to the top of the cathedral – there are some great views from there!
]]>So why Manchester? Well, for some time the company had been looking to relocate its Global Operations away from its HQ in Basel, Switzerland. And the UK offered an ideal business environment, though not without competition from other parts of the globe. However, in July 2015, Syngenta announced that it would open a Global Operations Centre in Didsbury, near Manchester, creating around 200 new jobs – providing in-house services in procurement, planning, logistics, IT and business process management. And so, on 11th March 2016, the formal opening took place in their relative new premises on the Towers Business Park.
The day itself included an introduction to the business, displays and a short tour of the facilities. The highlight was the official opening, which was performed by Sir Richard Leese (Leader of Manchester City Council) and Mark Peacock (Syngenta’s Head of Global Operations), to an audience of around 250 drawn from all parts of Syngenta’s business and a number of its partners. I was asked to say a few opening words about the importance of businesses like Syngenta – which are built on science and innovation as route to dealing with global agri-food supply challenges; I added that choosing Manchester is a great example of the Northern Powerhouse in action – it has a wonderful heritage of academia and industry (it is currently European City of Science) and the choice also points to the ready availability of highly skilled people, and the UK's business environment.
Sir Richard spoke of the strengths of the region and the welcome he had for the company, and talked of the strong industrial base both in Manchester and in other parts of the UK. Mark provided some of the story behind Syngenta’s ambitions and the background to its decision to bring its Global Operations to the UK. Listening to both, it was clear that there is a wealth of powerful narratives around this company, and no doubt the same could be said for many others who are similarly investing in the UK. These show the importance of strong links from research and innovation through to commercialisation, and the vital roles people and skills play in creating a successful, world-leading enterprise. As I headed south, I felt reassured by the ongoing faith placed in the UK by a major global business, and was reminded of the need to nurture our investors and manufacturers at every stage – from research right through to the day-by-day operational issues – but that if we do, then the rewards for the economy and for our society are immense.
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