ISHS Acta Horticulturae 495: WCHR - World Conference on Horticultural Research
POLICY ISSUES FOR NATIONAL RESEARCH PROGRAMMES IN HORTICULTURE - THE MAJOR IMPERATIVES |
| Author: | Ian J. Warrington | ||||||||||
| Abstract:
Countries throughout the world appear to have strong commonality with regard to policies and initiatives that secure the provision of food for their citizens. These same policies directly influence the support that is given to horticultural production and, consequently, to horticultural research within each country's boundaries. Policies established within each country will undoubtedly reflect the wealth of that particular nation, the form of government, the length of a political term or planning cycle, the need to resolve any current problems regarding security of food supply, and the need to anticipate future challenges. Major changes are occurring both globally and within individual nations and these are impacting on every economy to at least some extent.
For example, the Agriculture Research Service (ARS) of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) has identified, through inputs from consumers, industry representatives, administrators and scientists, ten major imperatives that will impact on policies for agricultural (including horticultural) research in the next 25 years.
These same imperatives, which could be written for any of a number of different countries, are as follows:
The comments in this paper are primarily relevant to developed countries purely as a consequence of their strong history of investment in horticultural research. Where possible, comments relevant to developing nations are made in the text. | |||||||||||
Download Adobe Acrobat Reader (free software to read PDF files) | |||||||||||
