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SAC - Proud Member of World-Beating Team (Archived Content)

SAC News Release Ref. No: 09N50
Published: 14 Aug 2009

Scotland tops the world rankings in agricultural science and SAC Chief Executive Bill McKelvey is delighted to be a member of a world-beating team. In the top 20 list of nations involved in agricultural science research, Scotland comes first, with England fourth, and the USA eleventh.

“We have always argued Scotland punches above its weight in science research” said Professor McKelvey. ”This data shows it was no empty boast. All of the bodies involved in Scottish agricultural science can take heart from this. Our sector is a winner for Scotland.”

The data, collected for this week's Times Higher Education Supplement by US-based Thomson Reuters, involves research papers published in the last 10 years. The rankings are based, not on the number of papers produced, but the number of times the research is quoted in other research papers.  Scotland’s 11.9 “citations” per paper beat England’s 9.75, America’s  8.36  and 6.8 for New Zealand.

Professor Bill McKelvey believes this is significant. “It shows that the work being done in Scotland on subjects like climate change, animal welfare and agriculture resonates around the world.  It is relevant research of the highest quality and something our nation can be proud of.  Now we have reached this position, it is important we continue to invest in sound science, especially given the present political concerns over food security." 

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News Release Issued By

Mr Ken Rundle
Senior Communications Officer
SAC (Scottish Agricultural College) Work SAC, King's Buildings, West Mains Road,
Edinburgh
EH9 3JG
TelWork 0131 535 4196

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