SCIENCE AND THE FARM

Evening Post, Volume CIX, Issue 36, 12 February 1930, Page 11

SCIENCE AND THE FARM

RESEARCH INFORMATION EIGHT BUKEAUX OPEN V (From "The Post's" Representative.) LONDON, 23rd December. At the second meeting of the executive council of tho Imperial Agricultural Bureaux, hold under the chairmanship of Sir Eobert Greig, it was announced that dispatches had been received from the overseas Empire Governments approving the establishment of tho eight Imperial Bureaux, and agreeing to contribute funds to support them for five years. All eight, bureaux are open and inquiries from oversea scientific workers aro received daily. To five of them senior officers.have been appointed, who already have experience, or have received, .part ■of their training, in tho Empire overseas. The object of the bureaux is to act as clearing houses of information for all research workers in the Empire in tho eight branches of agricultural science with which* they deal. Inquiries from oversea countries are dealt with through official correspondents nominated by each contributing Government, and correspondents have now been appointed in twentyseven Empire countries. The bureaux will also index, and, where necessary, translate scientific papers from all over the world, and circulate summaries to oversea workers so as to keep them iii touch with the latest publications which might not otherwise be available to them. •

One of the functions of the bureaux wijl be to foster personal, contact between research workers visiting tho United Kingdom. Arrangements have been made to advise tho bureaux of visits of research workers to the United Kingdom, and in particular it is proposed to hold next year two meet-> ings of workers in tho Empire in soil science and fruit production. Tho bureaux have all been set up a*: research stations, namely: Soil science at Bothamsted Experimental Station, Harpenden; animal nutrition at the Rowett Institute, Aberdeen; animal health at the Ministry of Agriculture's Veterinary Laboratories at Weybridge; animal genetics at tho animal breeding department of Edinburgh University; agricultural parasitology at the Institute of Agricultural Parasitology, St. Albans; plant genetics for herbage plants at tho Plant Breeding Station, Aberystwyth; plant genetics for crops at the Plant, Breeding Institute, Cambridge University;, and fruit production at East' Mailing, Kent.