Lorna Pate from SRUC's Rural Policy Centre speaks with Stuart Martin from the Digital Dairy Chain. Tune in to learn more about the origins and future aims of this project.

Welcome to another episode of The SRUC podcast. My name is Lorna Pate, and I'm a research associate at the Rural Policy Centre at SRUC.

In this episode I'm joined by Stuart Martin, who is the programme director of the recently launched Digital Dairy Chain, which is a £21 million project led by SRUC from Barony campus, near Dumfries. Stuart joined SRUC this January from NFU Scotland where he was the dairy policy manager.

Today, he's going to share with us the plans for the project and how this will impact on dairy farming in Scotland and the wider policy agenda.

So, let's get started. Hello, Stuart. Welcome to the podcast. Perhaps this week you begin with a summary of what the Digital Dairy Chain is and what it aims to do.

Thanks Lorna and thank for giving the opportunity to come along.

One of the issues we've had with the Dairy Chain is there's been lots of sort of narrative voids around it, and people are filling these voids in and everybody thinks it's something a bit different.

And I think that the first key thing is it is the Digital Dairy Chain, that's how we're referring to the project.

Our elevator pitch - you always get told if you can't describe yourself very succinctly then you've got problems - and how we see it is that we are essentially going to be transforming the dairy supply chain with innovation, collaboration, and growth. And if you take a second to understand that definition, then hopefully, and as we discuss it, it will cascade down. It'll become clear what we're doing.

One of the key things though, is just to maybe take a step back and put a bit of clarity on where this idea came from. Where this grant funding came from. Because it's not until you do that that people suddenly go: ‘Ah, now we understand what this project is all about’.

This project is funded through the UK Research and Innovation Grant. Now UKRI, as it's abbreviated, is a non-departmental public body sponsored by the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy.

And they invest in close collaborative work with others to build thriving, inclusive research and innovation systems. And they do this by focusing on productivity and prosperity. And they also try to approach it by levelling up. They work with regions where maybe economic activity is slightly stagnant and that's how they want to put their money out.

The other really interesting point is - and this maybe is our first very gentle touch on what governments are thinking and the way governments are moving. I think it was roughly about five weeks ago when the chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, made a fantastic speech where he outlined importance of enterprise, education and employment. And he also talked about ‘everywhere’ and this comes back to this point about the levelling up and moving investment around the UK.

But he also thumped in this whole point about the magical golden thread running through successful businesses is innovation. That is where the government want to come from. And they want to, I think, to stimulate and invest in as much as innovation as possible.

I think then as well you marry that up with the employment, I think it was only two weeks ago, of Michelle Donelon at UK level, who was appointed as Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, and I think that was a completely brand new role.

And these two things are, you know, fairly innocent and maybe, you know, I’m making tenuous links. But when you when you get that basic theory and foundation and you see where our grant funding’s come from then then it's very clear what this project's built on.

I think on that point, just for absolute clarity, as you say, this is a 5-year project using UKRI money of £21 million and it is to transform the dairy sector in the region and uplift rural economy via grant funding and other sustainable solutions.

We've been on your website, and we were looking at the project, and the geography is a bit confusing. Can you explain to us what areas the project covers?

I think geography is a really key point worth mentioning. And because we've maybe tripped ourselves up a bit on that. First of all, this project is rolled out across SW Scotland and Cumbria. Now we'll come to Cumbria bit first cause that's very easy because Cumbria's on the map and it's called Cumbria and you can draw a line around it and there we go. It’s very clearly defined by postcodes.

South West Scotland in my head, as somebody that's been in the dairy sector for 20 years, is anything between Stranraer and Dumfries and in between, but that's not the case in this project.

I think that's because if you're sitting in the middle of London and you look at a map, South West Scotland is a bigger chunk. And that's exactly what this project does.

If you can image. Sort of Glasgow a little bit into the right and then a straight line down. We are the bottom left-hand corner of South West Scotland, so we're trying to describe it as South and West Scotland.

But again, for clarity, it will involve Dumfries and Galloway, Ayrshire, parts of Renfrewshire and there's actually a couple of regions of Lanarkshire as well. And if people are looking for clarity on that and they visit our website, there's going to be a map there with postcodes.

The general theory behind that is then people involved in the project in that geographical area can have a direct input. Why that area? Because large chunk of dairy farmers are in that area and a lot of the supply chain in the dairy sector is in that that area as well.

What I would say though, is if somebody's out with the area, what we ask is one of the sort of the mantras we chant is if anybody has an interest outside the area specifically on the project and they can have a direct result on milk supply, the supply chain within the area, then we'd be willing to have a chat as well, so we don't rule anything out at all.

That's great. That's a big overview of a big project. What does your role involve and how do you see that changing during the five years of the project?

My role is to manage the project and again we're at an early stage. I think the key thing is, although SRUC is leading on this, we have 10 key grant drawing partners.

I'll just list them, as it gives a bit of gravitas to the project, and shows you what I'm doing in daily basis.

So SRUC are leading it and we're also working with University of Strathclyde and University of West of Scotland.

I think that shows the collaborative work with research organisations, if you like, which is a positive thing. One of the project leaders is an organisation called Censis and they are Scotland's Innovation Centre and they work with private and public organisations for all size to de-risk and accelerate innovation and help with technology barriers as well. And then - to add maybe a bit more meat on the bones the bones for people listening to this – we're working with First Milk, Latalis, Kendal Nutricare and organisation Cows & Co, which is Appleby Creamery.

And then and finally, National Milk Records - that a lot of people will know as NMR.

And then the last one, which is a really interesting organisation called Smart Stems. Smart Stems is an organisation that is going out into schools and, very broadly, to teach children about technology and things like innovation, new product development..

And so we're using them in this project as well, so we can push diary in a in a more positive way. So children growing up realise that it's not just about, you know, moving slurry from A to B or putting cups on cows…

The dairy industry is about robots, it is about technology, it is about sensors. It is about collecting data and it's trying to sort of, yeah, make that a bit more a bit more attractive if you like.

And how do you think the project will impact on Scotland's plans for net zero? You've obviously talked about innovation and collaboration and growth being your key themes in the project, but net zero?

The dairy supply chain has significant environmental impact and that's, you know, just thinking, including carbon emissions, water usage, even things like plastic packaging and then more issues on farms.

So I think the project is recognised as a an early date and a lot of the sort of projects we're doing within the umbrella off the whole project is going to be dealing with.

I mean, there is an imperative to transform the dairy sector to ensure long term sustainability. There's a demand out there for zero carbon food production, efficient resource use, waste minimisation and again, you know this demand pool for producing a safe, affordable, nutritious food.

And we need to look at that and I think with that we need to we need to be competitive as well.

And I think there was a great quote. I was told once and it's absolutely right is that, you know, a carbon efficient is an efficient farm. So I think our project will contribute to the net zero agenda by the adoption of technologies and practises on the farm that we can then in the short term actually make a fundamental difference and then roll them out. So there's a future legacy there.

But I think the important thing is we absolutely recognise. And where we're going with this and also, you know, I'm thinking about the new Scottish Agricultural Bill that's coming. It's very clear where Scottish Government are going and very clear where UK government is going as well.

Even more pragmatically, you know you're looking at the demands of people like the retailers and you're hearing and feeling that coming through Red Tractor standards and issues like that.

So we've got to and you know this whole theory of Scope 3 going from right to the retailer back to farms.

So, so we are listening and I would say that net zero is very much at the forefront of everything we deal with in the project.

Going back to the Scottish Government's Vision for Agriculture, do you have, or do you see any other role for the project in aligning itself with what the government have put out in their Vision for Agriculture?

Yeah, I think I think first of all and without saying too glib, the project is 5 years. I think it's still quite adaptable and projects of the size of this money can be that as well.

So I think of my aims and also all these stakeholders that I'm dealing with, I think we're flexible enough to move with what's gonna come down the railway tracks.

Thisis why we're working with farmers and the processors and the people in between at these stages so we can adapt. Again, we can't get beaten up by what's happening too much with external markets - things like milk prices - because there's very little we can do to control that. But we must recognise that's what's going to change where we are.

But again, specifically, I think you know Scottish Government, what the four pillars, if you like of this project is to develop digital connectivity.

That's #1 and that will be utilising advanced technology and research to add value, to connect to sector.

The second thing will be to stimulate research and development and that will be to provide the infrastructure and expertise to enable collaborative R&D projects and I think the key word there is collaboration. It's something I I'm quite passionate about is bringing farmers together and bringing farmers closer to their milk buyers too for desired results.

Again we need to and it's been recognised by Scottish Government - I'm not sure so much in the Ag Bill - but there there's been a couple of enquiry forums set up about this attraction of talent and skills. We need to showcase the industry and create opportunities for new talent and to discover the range of roles within modern day.

Since Brexit was a huge shortage of staff at ground level at farm we need to address. And also if this project to be successful, we need education level at Strathclyde, at SRUC. We need these universities to be developing the talent for the future.

I particularly feel this about daily farming in Scotland, and no disrespect other farmers, but some of the time that I've been through with price fluctuations and some of the things that have hit farmers is.

If somebody said sum up a Scottish dairy farmer, I would say they are incredibly resilient people and the final tranche of work then that I think is this facility of business growth. I think the supply chain can look at early ventures it can scale up.

We can work with established companies to look at new product development to look at process improvement.

And I think that that word again, that process improvement will come from Scottish Government as they change even how the single farm payment is changing about, you know paying for public good and paying to meet net zero targets.

Brilliant. Thank you.

So you've talked about the impact that the project could have. Can you tell us a little bit about how these groups are all going to work together and collaborate.

Essentially under the project and again this is this is my sort of day job, there is a number of work streams and there's people as we speak, beavering away on.

If we're thinking more about farmers here. One of the great things we've about supporting product development is we have created a what we know is a makerspace in Cumbria and we're also hopefully about to announce one in Ayrshire as well.

And what this will give is producers of dairy products and dairy based food and drink the chance to develop new products in a small scale kitchen environment. So essentially what that means is that Appleby Creamery in in Cumbria, we've funded and strapped on the sort of new product development kitchen on this cheese plant. Anybody in Scotland in the supply chain and in Cumbria that wants to take a brand new product and they can, they can go into the space and free of charge will be given access to these kitchens and will be given free access to a technician who knows how to how to sort of make the stuff and use the equipment.

And we can work from there. Another very simple thing is that we're looking at, I think innovation brokers and we have currently 3 innovation brokers out there and they are there to work alongside any business involved in the dairy sector supply chain from farmer to processor to cheese maker, ice cream.

If you have an innovative idea. You can access an innovation voucher of up to £10,000 and apply for the process and you'll get that money.

That money goes direct to one of the universities, and they will do the research, work on the people's behalf, and that again is to foster innovation.

And I think the really interesting one that we're going to be opening in April is the projects will ringfence £3 million for a larger grant fund and it's for collaborative research and development grant money and for the region that we described earlier on.

And this can be for people to apply to look at things like robotics, sensor advanced manufacturing, and that there will be an announcement on that grant funding in in April. And that's some of the work we're working on as well.

So as we are today, what is happening on the ground? Is there any developments within the project that you could talk to us about?

Yeah, I mean, I've only been in the job seven weeks, but there's been one of the projects in particular it's been working very well and actually achieved quite a lot and it's really looking at the whole supply chain, digitalisation now again that’s lots of complicated words.

But but through a lot of collaboration between the milk buyers that are the partners on it, that there's this whole theory of sort of digitising the whole supply chain and to drive efficiencies through it.

It sounds very complicated, but to easily describe so that they're looking at a smart farm. So on the farms we we're putting in place sensors and for data analysis and to look at things like animal welfare as well. They're also looking at transport, smart transport and that will be about how milk stored at farm level.

And also look at how the milks transported through a low carbon transport. The other one is smart factory and that is looking at advanced manufacturing that will help process control and also help added value products. Then the final one of these four sort of mini tranches of work.

Is what they call the smart network, and again, this is all about how we move data and very quickly and a lot of it and how we transfer that data and do it securely.

So again, sounds slightly complicated, but in the background there is work going on looking at farm gate level work on farm. How we move the milk. How we store the milk and a lot of work in factories to make the products better and then how we share that data and between these processes.

And again, I think the eventuality of that is, is to make the whole supply chain more efficient, which should, fingers crossed, drive down a better return right to the supply chain, right back to farm gate level.

Lots of things going on. So lastly, how can people find out more and get directly involved with the work going on at the Digital Dairy Chain?

We've got a fantastic website digitaldairychain.co.uk. I would go onto that . It sums up the project very well. It's really interesting for us listening in and speaking to people, we are changing the website on an almost daily basis just to tweak the language so we get it right.

So I'd go to that first of all. You will see that will outline a lot of the projects we're doing. You'll see the information about the grant funding and there's a contact list on that to contact us directly or feel free to contact me directly as well. Part of my day job just now is we're going out there and spreading the word and we're having a number of really interesting discussions with the whole supply chain in the region.

Fantastic. Thank you so much for your time today, Stuart.

SRUC's Rural Policy Centre is a knowledge hub for rural Scotland. We engage and collaborate with researchers, businesses and communities to share the latest knowledge with policymakers in Scotland. We hope you enjoyed listening today.