Young Dairy Farmer Wins First World Wide Sires' Travel Award

Richard Lawrence, an outstanding agricultural student from Harper Adams University College, has been named as the first winner of The World Wide Sires' Travel Award. This is a new bursary established at the Shropshire-based College by leading cattle breeding company, World Wide Sires UK, to reward high academic achievement.

Richard (22) a young dairy farmer from Grange-over-Sands near Kendal, Cumbria, has studied Agriculture with Animal Science at Harper Adams for the past four years. He scooped the travel prize for his project on cattle breeding, completed during the final year of his degree. The WWS' Award will fund an all-expenses-paid trip for him to the USA, where he will visit a number of high-tech dairy farms, as well as the World Dairy Expo in Madison, Wisconsin. This event runs for five days starting in late September and showcases the finest dairy cattle and the newest technologies available to the global dairy industry.

Commenting on his prize, Richard said: "I'm really looking forward to visiting the States because so many agricultural innovations come from there. Many of the world's top dairy sires also emanate from American bull studs, so I'll be able to learn a lot and bring home plenty of new ideas to my family's own 120-cow Lynholme Herd of Holsteins."

Professor Liam Sinclair from Harper Adams said: "We are very grateful to World Wide Sires UK for establishing and sponsoring this award at the College. An award of this calibre is very motivational for students, and we are delighted to have the opportunity to collaborate with well-known company to facilitate knowledge transfer within the industry. Richard has been an outstanding student and he is a worthy recipient."