From Bill Parker, ADAS Research and Development
Wolverhampton
Your comment about the Apple and Pear Research Council may have raised a
smile (Feedback, 1 March). But, of course, it’s not a government research
council, but a body that collects money from the industry (in this case top
fruit growers) and uses it to fund R&D.
With the cutbacks in government-funded research in recent years, levy bodies
such as the APRC have become important alternative sources of funding for
agricultural and horticultural research scientists in public and private
research institutes and universities. The demise of such organisations probably
means more scientists’ jobs are to be lost or are under threat.
There are a number of similar levy bodies which collect money from growers
and use it to fund research: the Horticultural Development Council, the Home
Grown Cereals Authority, the Potato Marketing Board and the small Processors and
Growers Research Organisation. Thankfully for many researchers, most of these
are still very much in business.
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