Phd Studentship: Optimising pasture-based ruminant production systems

With the annual throughputs of 2.94 million cattle and 14.6 million sheep, UK ruminant farms and the associated sectors produce meat products worth £9.8 billion per year. The industry employs 590,000 people across the value chain in England alone and its existence is widely considered to be indispensable for the maintenance of various ecosystem services, country landscapes and rural communities. In particular, pasture-based ruminant production systems utilise land unsuitable for arable crop production by converting forages to high-quality protein sources for humans, and therefore have the potential to contribute to global food security without initiating the food-feed competition for natural resources.

At the same time, ruminants are a significant source of greenhouse gas emissions, with 10 percent of human-induced carbon footprint attributable to their production around the world. The industry is also a leading polluter of UK waterways, where typically undulating topography increases the likelihood of nutrient leaching. Given this trade-off between the costs and benefits brought into society by ruminant production, there is a clear and urgent need to identify strategies that can improve the system-wide performances of the industry.

Recent research based on producer surveys has shown that the economic performance of UK livestock farms have a level of variability far beyond what can be explained by the geographical and biophysical conditions they operate in, and even more crucially, their economic performance is strongly correlated with environmental performance. This finding, combined with the estimated figure that more than 90% of global warming potential along the UK value chain for beef and lamb are attributable to on-farm activities, suggests that economic optimisation of ruminant production systems will not only benefit UK society economically but also environmentally.

Using the rich dataset and state-of-the-art facilities available at Rothamsted Research’s North Wyke Farm Platform (NWFP: http://www.rothamsted.ac.uk/farmplatform), this project provides the student with a unique opportunity to investigate options to enhance environmental performance of pasture-based ruminant production systems by the means of economic optimisation. While a stronger emphasis will be placed on sheep production systems (which have been shown to be environmentally less efficient than beef systems in the UK), strategies for optimal resource allocation between the beef and lamb sectors will also be explored as part of the research. Outputs from the project will be directly disseminated to the industry through the large network of commercial farms maintained by AHDB, the levy board for English agricultural producers who sponsors this research.

How to apply:

Please make an online application for this project at http://www.bristol.ac.uk/pg-howtoapply. Please select ‘Faculty of Health Sciences’ and then ‘Veterinary Sciences_(PhD)’ on the Programme Choice page and enter details of the studentship when prompted in the Funding and Research Details sections of the form. Shortlisted applicants will be invited to interviews after the closing date.

Contacts:

Dr Taro Takahashi (taro.takahashi@bristol.ac.uk)

Professor Michael Lee (michaelrf.lee@bristol.ac.uk)

Funding Notes

Funding:

AHDB Beef & Lamb PhD Studentship (View Website)

This studentship will cover a stipend equivalent to the ongoing rate for BBSRC Doctoral Training Programmes (currently £14,296 per annum), UK/EU tuition fees for 36 months and costs to conduct the aforementioned research. Applications from international students outside of the EU will be considered; however the candidate would be expected to fund the difference between UK/EU fees and overseas fees.

Candidate requirements:

Standard University of Bristol eligibility rules apply. Please visit View Website for more information.

Supervisors: Dr Takahashi and Prof Lee