SCIENCE teachers in the New England have been given a chance to see how much of a role the subject plays in the local agricultural industry.
A development workshop, held over two days, was set up as part of the Primary Industry Centre for Science Education (PICSE) program. Teachers were guided around sites across the region to demonstrate just how important science is at some key sites.
Some sites include Top of the Range Tomatoes at Guyra, the Tamworth Agricultural Institute and UNE.
Associate professor David Lamb guided a collection of teachers around Petersons Armidale Winery. Prof Lamb said that the development program was aimed at encouraging teachers to promote agricultural and scientifically influenced subjects at school.
“It’s all about drawing the connection between core type sciences like physics, chemistry, maths and biology and agricultural science,” he said.
“It’s sort of to get the kids enthused about agriculture as a scientific subject, which it is now.
“Agriculture nowadays is becoming so much more technological that kids that study agriculture now need to have just as solid a basis in quantitative skills as kids do in science.”
Prof Lamb said the agricultural industry had set its sights on some of the brightest young achievers in the country and was keen to draw students into the challenging world of agricultural science.
“The stuff that we’re seeing out of agriculture now is really taxing from an agriculture perspective. There are a lot of technologies and gadgets out there that farmers need to use,” he said.
“So I think part of this day is all about showing these teachers just how much science is in agriculture with the view that these guys will go back to the school and target the bright kids.
“That’s where UNE comes in, we’ve got an ideal mix. We’ve got a lot of agricultural science and environmental science but also a lot of hard science.”
Prof Lamb said the dwindling resources and rising demand had put immense pressure on produce industries.
“Farmers have got to do a lot more with a lot less and that’s where the technology comes into it,” he said.
The Petersons tour was planned to show teaches a project that has been running in the vineyards sine 2006. As the New England is a developing wine region it is facing its fair share of obstacles.
“The New England is quite a premier wine grape growing region. It’s a cool climate region,” Prof Lamb said.
“We have coolish days and really clear nights and you can make really top quality reds and whites in that sort of environment. The problem is, we’ve got an issue with late spring frosts.”
UNE has been involved with a frost protection trial that is experimenting with running heated cables along the vines.
The visiting teachers were given the opportunity to view the cutting edge science and see for themselves just how important science will be in the future of the agricultural world.
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