AgResearch has just completed an internal restructuring programme which will better support the development of valuable technologies and productivity growth in the pastoral sector.

AgResearch Chief Executive Dr Andy West believes the restructuring allows greater representation of scientists at the executive, decision making level.

“This will give our scientists a much greater voice.  It will allow me to have much better communication with our scientific staff and their opinions and advice will be better heard by the executive and the Board.

“The first step in introducing the new structure was made about four months ago when we created three new Science and Technology General Manager positions. Appointments to these roles were made in August and September.

“The next step, which we have just completed, was to reduce the management layers between these new General Managers (GMs) and the scientists. This has been achieved with the appointment of fourteen Section Managers who will report to the GMs. The new structure will also allow us to be more flexible in adjusting to funding shifts and seizing on opportunities.”

“It is early days, but we expect science in strategic decision making to increase, communication to be faster and more focused, revenues to grow, customers to be assisted more effectively, and our leadership role in helping support the pastoral sector to grow.”

"All staff appointed to Section Manager positions are scientists of outstanding calibre and I am delighted to announce their acceptance of the following roles."

 
AgResearch Ruakura (Hamilton)

• Dr Nicola Simmons - Meat Quality and Safety
• Dr Allan Pearson - Growth and Development
• Dr Kerst Stelwagen - Dairy Science

Dr Liz Wedderburn – Land and Environmental Management

AgResearch Grasslands (Palmerston North)

• Dr Harry Clark - Rumen and Welfare
• Dr Chris Jones - Forage Biotechnology
• Dr Warren McNabb - Nutrition and Metabolism
• Dr Syd Easton - Forage Improvement
• Dr Greg Lambert - Integrated Agricultural Systems

 
AgResearch Wallaceville (Upper Hutt)

• Dr Ken McNatty - Ovulation
• Dr Wayne Hein - Animal Health
   

AgResearch Lincoln (near Christchurch)

• Dr Travis Glare - Biocontrol & Biosecurity

 
AgResearch Invermay (Dunedin)

• Dr Theresa Wilson - Animal Genomics
• Peter Johnstone - Applied Mathematics & Bioinformatics
  
   

Following, in brief, are some of the career highlights of the Section Managers.

Dr Harry Clark  Rumen and Welfare
Dr Harry Clark studied agriculture at the University College of North Wales, Bangor, and graduated with a PhD in 1986. After five years working for MAFF in the UK he moved to New Zealand in 1991 to work for AgResearch studying the impacts of climate change on pastoral agriculture. Since 2001 he has been the leader of a team quantifying enteric methane emissions from New Zealand ruminants.

Dr Chris Jones                  Forage Biotechnology
Dr Chris Jones is a plant molecular biologist, who initially worked in the development of plant transformation technologies at British Sugar and then in the Brassica and Oilseeds Department at the John Innes Centre in the UK. He gained his PhD from the University of Dundee while located at the Scottish Crop Research Institute, investigating gene expression related to fruit ripening in raspberry. He then worked at Zeneca Agrochemicals, now Syngenta, identifying novel wheat genes and their promoters as part of the 'gene switch' team. He arrived in New Zealand in 2000, recruited by Fletcher Challenge Forests to run their molecular biology laboratory in the Bay of Plenty, and worked in support of an international forestry biotechnology venture, ArborGen, and on the development of marker assisted selection in radiata pine. He joined AgResearch in May 2003 to lead the Pastoral Genomics project team, investigating the application of functional genomics and molecular mapping technologies for the improvement of white clover.

Dr Warren McNabb        Nutrition & Metabolism
Dr Warren McNabb gained his PhD in nutrition from Massey University in 1990. He specialises in nutrition and metabolism and more recently nutrient-gene interactions that ultimately regulate the supply of nutrients to tissues. A feature of this work has been the development of sophisticated 'surgical models' for large-animal metabolic studies [gut, liver, mammary]. Warren and his team are recognised internationally for their expertise in this field. His 143 publications include 112 in scientific literature and three invited plenary papers to international conferences and workshops. He is an Associate Professor at Massey University, a Council Member for the NZIAS, Director of the Palmerston North Medical Research Foundation, and winner of four fellowships and six scholarships. Currently he oversees $2.3 million of research programmes/contracts and as a Team Leader, manages several scientists and 12-15 other staff.

Dr Syd Easton                   Forage Improvement
Dr Syd Easton’s career has been in Plant Breeding, first at DSIR Grasslands and then at AgResearch. He has been involved in developing lucerne and grass cultivars within a commercial partnership, and in the endophyte research that led to the release of the ryegrass strain AR1. His publications include work in genetic control of variation in traits such as leaf shear strength, herbage nutrient content, seed production, response to nutrient and management stress and host influence on the metabolism of endophyte.

Dr Greg Lambert                 Integrated Agricultural Systems
Dr Greg Lambert has a Masters degree in agricultural science from Massey University and a PhD from the Pennsylvania State University. His research career spans a wide range of topics including factors influencing hill pasture performance, nutrient cycling, weed control, fertiliser responses, forage shrubs, beef cattle reproduction and beef quality, and grazing systems research involving sheep, beef cattle and goats. He managed the successful Meat New Zealand Pasture Quality Workshops programme, and manages a national programme examining the economic and environmental implications of nitrogen fertiliser use on hill country. Greg has held a range of science management positions, commencing with Officer-in-Charge of the Ballantrae Research Station, Science Manager with DSIR Grasslands, and most recently Leader of the AgResearch Innovative Systems team.

Dr Nicola Simmons               Meat Quality and Safety

Dr Nicola Simmons has a PhD in  Meat Science from Bristol University and has been a practicing researcher for 15 years.  For three years in the late 1980s she lectured at the College for the Distributive Trades, London, on muscle physiology, meat science and food hygiene. From 1990–1993 she was a Research Associate in the Department of Meat Animal Science at the University of Bristol. In 1994 she joined AgResearch as a Senior Researcher in the Food Systems & Technology Platform (formerly MIRINZ). Since 2003 she has been a Team Leader for the Meat Science Group, Food Systems & Technology Platform. She is responsible for the acquisition of commercial revenue from the meat and related food sector and is client manager for one of the major NZ processing companies and a large European based supermarket chain. She headed the project team that was responsible for the scientific and technical development of new processing guidelines for the New Zealand beef and lamb industry.

Dr Allan Pearson                        Growth and Development
Dr Allan Pearson has been a practicing researcher for thirty years.  He was a scientist with the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries from 1973 to 1992 during which time he undertook research examining the endocrinology of stress in farm animals, possum reproduction, behaviour, physiology and animal health, farmed fur and meat, fibre growth physiology and endocrinology.  For the last fourteen years he has worked with AgResearch researching possum conditioned food aversions and disease transmission, and fibre growth physiology, endocrinology and molecular biology. Most recently he has led a team of research staff focused on gene discovery and commercialisation applied to wool and hair growth. He was President of the NZ Society of Endocrinology from 2000 -2003.

Dr Kerst Stelwagen      Dairy Science  
Dr Kerst Stelwagen, from The Netherlands, came to New Zealand 12 years ago after spending 10 years in Canada.  A lactation physiologist by training, he has been a dairy scientist with his research recognised internationally and published widely. During the last four and half years he has headed the Dairy Biotechnology group at AgResearch's Ruakura campus.

Dr Liz Wedderburn       Land and Environmental Management
Dr Liz Wedderburn arrived in New Zealand from Scotland in 1982 to undertake a Post Doc on Maku Lotus in South Island High Country. In 1985 she moved to Hamilton to work at the Whatawhata hill country station and spent seven years researching ryegrass and white clover genotype and their interactions with the environment. In the early nineties she became involved in sustainable land management, leading hill country programmes, study groups where farmers merged production and environmental outcomes and gaining access to the world of policy and resource management. She was National Programme Leader for the forage and ecology group, then Science Leader for land and environmental management.

Dr Ken McNatty                  Ovulation
Dr Ken McNatty received his MSc (1^st Hons) degree at Victoria University of Wellington in Chemistry and his PhD in Reproductive Biology at the University of Edinburgh Medical School, Edinburgh. Following his PhD studies on hormone function in human ovaries he undertook postdoctoral studies at Harvard Medical School, Boston, and thereafter he was the Boerhaave Professor of Reproductive Biology at the University of Leiden Medical School, The Netherlands. Since 1981, apart from sabbatical leave, he has been a scientist at the AgResearch Wallaceville Animal Research Centre investigating how naturally–occurring genetic mutations in sheep affect ovulation and fertility and developing fertility-based vaccines and hormonal therapeutics. Ken is a Fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand and a recipient of the Distinguished Scientist award by the Society for Reproduction and Fertility (UK) and the McMeekan award by the New Zealand Society of Animal Production. 

Dr Wayne Hein                   Animal Health
Dr Wayne Hein is a registered Veterinary Surgeon with the Veterinary Council of New Zealand.  He obtained his PhD at the Australian National University and has 19 years post-doctoral research in immunology.  Wayne’s special interest and expertise is in the immune system of ruminant animals.  Prior to joining AgResearch in 1998 as Science Leader to the Immunoparasitology group and then Science Leader for Animal Health, Wayne worked at the Basel Institute for Immunology, Switzerland, for 11 years as a Senior scientist, where his primary research interests included lymphocyte markers, lymphocyte recirculation, ontogeny of the immune system and molecular genetics of antigen receptors in sheep.  Major achievements whilst at Basel included molecular cloning of all known sheep T-cell receptors, establishing the prominence of T-cells in ruminants and charting the development of T and B-cell antigen receptor repertoires.

Dr Travis Glare                 Biocontrol and Biosecurity
Dr Travis Glare is an insect pathologist by training and worked on developing microbes as biological control agents of pest insects.  He obtained his PhD from the Australia National University in Canberra and has been in New Zealand about 15 years, working first for MAFTech, then AgResearch since its inception.  As well as pest control projects in New Zealand and overseas, he has been involved in programmes on environmental impacts of genetically modified organisms (GMOs), horizontal gene transfer and has an interest in the application of molecular technologies for the study of disease process and phylogenetics of insects and microbes.

Dr Theresa Wilson                       Animal Genomics
Dr Theresa Wilson has a very broad range of scientific expertise. Her career began as a plant biochemist developing enzyme assays for key biosynthetic enzymes, then moved into plant molecular biology, then to some physiology using oocytes from Xenopus toads. She has worked with virulence genes from bovine tuberculosis and more recently moved to animal genomic technologies. A key focus is the application of high quality science and new technologies to work with the sheep, deer and cattle industries to achieve their potential.

Peter Johnstone                 Applied Mathematics and Bioinformatics
Peter Johnstone received his initial education in Tasmania. Discovering hidden mysteries through the application of elegant statistics is an ongoing highlight of his career. Others include the publication of his book about experimental planning and his selection as the leader of Vanda Station in the Antarctic.  He has been a statistician with AgResearch and its predecessor for 33 years.