Matching R&D with producer needs

摘要

A colleague recently had a conversation with a research scientist about some work he had been doing on improving profitability from Merino sheep. The research had looked at the range of average fleece microns in the first shearing of a typical flockand, based on culling a certain percentage of the drop, had shown how the lifetime profitability of the age group could be substantially raised. "It won't work," my friend said, to which the response was less than polite. "Why not?" he replied. Because put simply, with that culling rate, the profitability of the flock will fall; because in a self-replacing flock, there will not be the numbers to maintain the optimum Stocking rate. There has been no account of the capital requirements to find the extra numbers required." "I hadn't thought of that," was the reply.