Scottish Agricultural College

Climate Change and Cattle Farming Systems

R&D/SLS/Waterhouse

SAC is a Scottish organisation dedicated to innovation and the transfer of knowledge to the land based industries.  Our 900 staff provide consultancy, research, education & training services to rural businesses and communities via a nation-wide network of around 40 business units.

SAC is able to offer research studentships focusing on whole farm greenhouse gas emissions on either dairy or beef cattle systems.

UK cattle systems for dairy and beef are seen to contribute a very significant proportion of total greenhouse gas emissions, directly through methane, through their waste products and via the crops that are grazed and grown for them. Yet, food production is a human necessity and simply importing our food from elsewhere in the world is not an option in a one world approach. Better knowledge of the role of farming system in net greenhouse gas emissions is essential to ensuring that farming can make contributions towards reducing net emissions. Much is understood about the components of the farming systems; nutrition, breeding, waste management and grazing and cropping systems, though there are considerable gaps in knowledge and application in some important areas.

In the dairy study, the emphasis will be upon to examine the relationships at the cow level among different environmental outputs (greenhouse gas emissions, nitrates, phosphorus), biological outputs (milk yield, fertility), productions diseases (mastitis, lameness and metabolic diseases), and economic efficiency in different dairy systems.

In the beef systems study, the emphasis will be whole farm studies, scaling up existing data from three contrasting breeds to consider how different components of the whole farm beef system interact, identifying how other issues of land management and system choices interact with animal based issues, such as nutrition, breed and genetics.

The studentships will be based at SAC Dairy Research Centre in Dumfries and SAC Beef Research Centre at the Bush Estate in Edinburgh respectively, and will use and have access to considerable farm data on each site.

The stipend will be £12,940 per annum. The funding of this studentship is costed for European Union students only.  Fees up to £3,300 per annum will be paid.

Application packs are available from Clair Anderson (clair.anderson [at] sac.ac [.] uk). Further project details are available for the dairy and beef studies respectively from Dr Mizeck Chagunda (01387 263961, mizeck.chagunda [at] sac.ac [.] uk) or Dr Tony Waterhouse (01786 824540, tony.waterhouse [at] sac.ac [.] uk) or contacted centrally at SAC, Scottish Agricultural College, West Mains Road, Edinburgh EH9 3JG.

Applications should be submitted by Friday 29 May 2009

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