The first in a series of biographies of keynote speakers and panellist for Footprint Forum: GM – Contemptible or Inevitable 28th of February, U.S Embassy, London. If you are a member of Footprint Forum and have not yet registered Click Here
Professor Crute is the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board’s first Chief Scientist. Ian was formerly the Director of Rothamsted Research with overall responsibility for all scientific, operational, commercial and external liaison activities of the institute, a post he has held since 1999. The crop portfolio at Rothamsted covers cereals, oilseeds, sugar beet, potatoes, willow and miscanthus and input into tropical crops.
Ian has a First Class Honours degree in botany and a PhD in plant pathology from the University of Newcastle upon Tyne. From 1973 to 1986 he was a research group leader in plant pathology at what is now Warwick-HRI (formerly Horticulture Research International – Wellesbourne). In 1986 he obtained a Fulbright Fellowship and went to the University of Wisconsin in Madison, USA to work on the genetics of resistance to fungal pathogens. On returning to England in 1987 he moved to HRI East Malling (now East Malling Research) as Head of the Crop and Environment Protection Department. He moved back to HRI at Warwick in 1993 and after two years as Head of Plant Pathology he became Director at Wellesbourne with overall responsibility for the research direction at the site until his move to Rothamsted.
Ian’s scientific contributions are recorded in over 160 publications; he was awarded the Research Medal of the Royal Agricultural Society of England in 1992 and the British Crop Production Council Medal in 2006. He was elected President of the British Society for Plant Pathology in 1995, and holds a Visiting Professorship in the Faculty of Biological Sciences at the University of Oxford. His committee and board memberships include: Chairman of the Sainsbury Laboratory Council, member of the Lead Expert Group on the “Future of Food and Farming” Foresight project and Board member of HGCA’s Crop Evaluation Ltd. Ian also is on the editorial board of a number of scientific journals including Food Security, Outlooks on Pest Management and Plant Protection Science.
