3 November 2006 Lincoln agricultural qualifications respected worldwide

Overseas demand for Kiwi qualified accountants, doctors, nurses and teachers is well known and degrees in these fields are international passports to employment. Less widely known here at home is the strong impression New Zealand agricultural science graduates make on overseas employers.

Lincoln University's agricultural science degree and associated postgraduate qualifications are very highly regarded internationally, says Associate Professor Derrick Moot, who year after year sees many of his students successfully land good professional positions overseas.

Among Associate Professor Moot's former students whose Lincoln qualifications took him overseas is BAgrSc (Honours) and PhD graduate Hamish Brown.

Originally from a sheep and beef farm in Cromwell, Central Otago, Hamish was a top student at Lincoln winning a Bright Future Top Achievers Doctoral Scholarship for his PhD study.

"As with most of our agricultural students they are 'head hunted' by employers and lined up with jobs before they graduate," says Associate Professor Moot.

In Hamish's case he had job offers in Australia and Palmerston North and also considered a position in Germany, but turned them down in favour of a postdoctoral fellowship at the National Institute of Crop Science in Japan, at Tsukuba near Tokyo.

His work there was a "massive leap" from the research he did for his PhD on the yield and water use of dryland forage crops and specifically lucerne. In Japan he was investigating late moisture stress on rice crops. It was interesting work, he says.

Now back in New Zealand, Hamish is a crop physiologist with the Crown Research Institute Crop and Food Research Ltd in Lincoln. He's working in the Crop Physiology and Agronomy Group and is currently involved with research on potatoes and forage crops.

As 2006 draws to a close Associate Professor Moot is farewelling another crop of agricultural science students who have completed their studies.

"The majority are going straight into jobs," he says. "Others are going on to postgraduate work, and others are going on their OE's. Whatever path they take, they've all got a very 'in demand' qualification."

Ian Collins, Communications Group, Lincoln University, Canterbury, New Zealand