Farmers slow to pick up discoveries

Few could fail to be impressed by reading the annual report of just one of New Zealand's crown research institutes devoted to primary industry science.

The 1998 year in review for AgResearch, the biggest of the four such institutes, lists such newly discovered wonders as functionally enhanced dairy food, proof that deer velvet stimulates the human immune system, and a gene that will pave the way for meatier sheep and cattle.

Another thick institute portfolio lists discoveries that have been taken a step further and are now offered as products or services.

It includes vaccines that increase the fertility of breeding ewes or protect against diseases, plant cultivars that improve the agronomic performance from pasture, and computer-backed services that advise farmers on the quality of pasture and supplements on their properties.

Despite such registers, and the acknowledgement that many profitable advances in New Zealand agriculture directly result from homegrown research, concern is growing that the sector is falling behind.

Retiring Affco chairman Peter Jackson recently took a swipe at sheep and beef farmers for failing to use new technology to lift their farm gate returns.

Mr Jackson, a successful dry stock farmer who chaired the North Island's biggest meat company for 10 years, also admitted that meat companies had been slow to adopt new technology.

He rued the fact that they had let the now-ubiquitous accelerated conditioning and ageing meat tendering process languish for about 20 years after researchers had proven its benefits.

The vice-chancellor of Lincoln University, Dr Frank Wood, is prepared to spread the fault wider. Dr Wood, who has also led research efforts in the agriculture, horticulture, wine and forestry sectors, says sheep and beef farmers are not alone. He also has an explanation for producers' apparent shortsightedness.

"There are plenty of stories that show that unless the market signal is translated back to the farmer, and therefore integrated into the value chain, there is not the same incentive for them to pick the technology up," he says.

In the meat industry's case, its unhappy relationship with research has even extended to science establishments it has helped to fund.

Short of funds from home, the Hamilton-based Meat Industry Research Institute was forced to look for funding overseas to maintain a research base regarded - if only by some - as essential to the industry.

It is a quandary shared by other research bodies. The lion's share of the Government's Public Good Science Fund has traditionally gone to crown research institutes for work in the agricultural sector.

Yet agricultural industries themselves have been light contributors to the funding. In contrast, manufacturers get a small share of the public good fund but pay a larger proportion out of their own resources.

The Minister for Crown Research Institutes, Simon Upton, made the point in February, at the opening of Crop and Food Research's new $7.6 million Food Industry Science Centre in Palmerston North.

"If New Zealand businesses aren't prepared to invest in the potential that [crown research institutes] offer, I am happy for them to look for offshore buyers - if that is what it takes to retain the skills base in New Zealand."

The institutes and universities represented a high proportion of intellectual capital generated by New Zealand, Mr Upton said. It was critical that it be retained, nurtured and taken full advantage of.

"Our future increase in GDP will be largely dependent on the generation and application of knowledge."

Academics who keep a watching brief on New Zealand research and its uptake uniformly praise the country's historic strength in agricultural research.

The dean of science at Auckland University, Professor Ralph Cooney, says New Zealand has "excellent human capital" in its researchers in very selected areas, particularly biology. The country is less strong in its research infrastructure.

Victoria University senior management lecturer Deb Gilbertson says that despite the acknowledged strengths, the country is doing poorly in its efforts to move out of commodity products. "It's not for the want of ideas."

She says that what is needed is people with passion, because the adoption of research is not a linear process which starts with basic research and goes on to an end product. "There's got to be a demand pool. People have to want to make it happen."

Deb Gilbertson says small players can make a go of things but real, nationwide success lies in clusters of business that complement and feed off one another.

The AgResearch chief executive, Keith Steele, is at the sharp point of agricultural research - an exciting but sometimes painful place to be.

In research on forage plants, "we are leading the world," he says confidently, "but it's a precarious position. We've focussed on a niche area."

Why? Because New Zealand has been left to it - until now.

The United States biotechnology industry, which has spent its time on crops such as corn, wheat and rice, has now cast a glance at forage crops.

When, like AgResearch, you have $93 million to spend a year, it's a worry when an industry that spends $6 billion annually focuses on your patch.