The ARF has been extremely busy over the past two years with many significant meetings and numerous collaborative activities, from research right through to knowledge transfer.This is only to be expected as levy board employees gain a greater understanding of both the activities and people in the respective partner organisations. Building these relationships in times of diminishing research funds beyond the levy boards has been a key component in maximising the value for money delivered from research back to the levy payer, whatever the sector.

Milton Keynes Away Day

In December 2006, it was agreed that technical directors from each of the levy boards and representatives from the knowledge transfer group would meet to improve understanding of each other's goals and objectives and to identify genuine opportunities for collaboration.

Subjects debated included:

• research strategy development
• research commissioning and contracting
• project monitoring and annual reporting
• measuring the true value of research projects
• measuring the performance of research and development contractors
• models for investment levels associated with the communications outcomes of projects.

This identified key areas for further exploration, common areas of work and a genuine sharing of understanding and best practice.

Soils and climate change were the two priority areas selected for further investigation and a lead levy board was nominated for each subject. Further information on these projects can be found later in this report.

Soils

Climate change (additional to current communications programme)

Others

  
This list has formed the backbone of this year's activities.

Forum for the Future

This project, which started in 2006, has benefited greatly from invaluable input from the respective ARF levy boards and has proved to be an excellent communications exercise.The positive case studies on the Farming Futures website are great PR for the industry at a time when agriculture has negative associations in relation to climate issues (see later).

Knowledge Transfer Group

Since the development of the priority areas, the knowledge transfer group has evolved from working on
general activities to focusing and working on these key topics.This move has aligned the KT group activities with that of the research directors so the group can now make valued contributions at directors' meetings.

The group has also been busy building links with key organisations to enhance either the message or delivery effectiveness of individual levy board knowledge transfer programmes. Many of these meetings involved complementary presentations from levy board representatives working in similar areas.
The levy boards are also now taking a much more collaborative approach with the Regional Development Agencies (RDAs).This is a challenging exercise for organisations that are established to deliver national (as opposed to smaller, regional) KT programmes. I believe that the levy boards will be a key component of delivery in the regions, ensuring that research outcomes are made available at the earliest opportunity to the levy payer.

Closer links to Government Organisations

Due to the lessening availability of government agricultural research activities to the levy boards, it is now even more important to strengthen links with relevant government departments. I am pleased to report that we have strong representation on the ARF and are improving communication between the ARF and governmental departments which will enable us to collaborate on a range of different activities in the future.

Levy Boards Review

With the developments associated with this review the importance of the ARF model is vital to ensuring that levy payers continue to receive the results of targeted R&D activities for their respective sectors. The continual communication between levy boards, aided by the development of a research discussion forum for the technical directors, ensures that levy spend is maximised and the quality of outcomes on research is at the highest possible level.

Whatever the final outcome of the review process, the ARF will continue to collaborate for the benefit of its customers. Due to the nature of the changes taking place, we have agreed to do this ARF report over a longer period so that we can start afresh from April 2008.

Thank you

Finally, I must say a huge thank you to both Graham Jellis and Michele Charlton of the HGCA who have managed the ARF since its inception to an incredibly high standard. The smooth transition to myself and Jennie Cremin was totally due to the professional manner in which they work.We just hope that we can maintain the high standards they have set!

Brian Lindsay
Lead Technical Director
March 2008