Productivity, engagement and new discoveries are the main themes running through the latest annual report of Rothamsted Research. The report also reflects on the achievements of the past five years, from 2012 to 2017, as the former strategic plan ends. It is available to download from today.

Download the Annual report 2016-17

"We helped to found three of the UK’s four new agri-tech centres, staged a popular forum on innovation and, with the NFU, came up with what’s needed for a UK agri-science sector outside the EU," says Achim Dobermann, Rothamsted’s Director and Chief Executive, in his foreword.

On research, Dobermann notes: “We are pioneering a chemical spray for enhancing crop yields; we showed that damaged biodiversity can recover; and we revealed nutritional risks facing 1 billion people worldwide.”

The report also looks at the institute’s international activities over the past year, its taking over at the helm of the Africa Soil Information Service (AfSIS), the fruits of its continuing alliance with Syngenta, the opportunities for postgraduates at Rothamsted and its public engagement activities.

The leaders of the four strategic programmes between 2012 and 2017 (20:20 Wheat; Delivering Sustainable Systems; Designing Seeds; and Cropping Carbon) summarise the science and impact of their teams’ work.

The heads of the four National Capabilities of the same period (Rothamsted Insect Survey; Long-Term Experiments; North Wyke Farm Platform and Pathogen-Host Interactions Database) have done similarly.

In his vision statement to conclude the report, Dobermann looks ahead to 2030, the year when the current 17 Sustainable Development Goals of the United Nations end. “That is all the time we have to make the more transformative changes towards a more sustainable development path,” he says.

By 2030, Dobermann foresees the elimination of extreme poverty; revitalised yields of the world’s staple cereal crops with traits that make them more healthy and resistant to damage; novel plants producing fish oils and pharmaceutical drugs; and livestock farming that is managed sustainably and environmentally.

“In the UK and globally, in collaboration with industry, we must focus on solutions, and I stress solutions, for agriculture,” concludes Dobermann. “Just as importantly, our goals must also meet high environmental standards and not only productivity targets. We can do this.”