POULTRY SCIENCE - THE NEXT 20 YEARS

1. The theme of the lecture is that research in poultry science has mo ved too far in the direction of molecular biology and away from studie s with whole animals. This has happened partly because exciting prospe cts are opening up in the field of gene manipulation but mainly becaus e of the use of inappropriate referees to evaluate research proposals. 2. Agricultural research is defined as work intended to benefit agric ulture and directed towards those problems which seem capable of solut ion. Science research is something else. Too much of the money allocat ed for agricultural and biotechnology research is being spent on scien ce research. The system of rewarding agricultural scientists needs to be adjusted away from counting papers published. 3. Some examples are given of problems in poultry science which seem likely to be soluble b y gene manipulation. These include ''essential'' amino acid synthesis within the chicken, improvement of shell strength, the prevention of m any diseases, but probably not the improvement of quantitative traits or of behavioural adaptation to intensive husbandry. 4. Examples are a lso given of problems likely to require empirical solutions, such as t he benefits of acclimatisation or the long-term response to a lighting programme. Here the need is to develop better theories to guide model ling activities. 5. The author concludes that there is much research t hat can and should be done in poultry science in the next 20 years but calls for a recognition that some problems cannot be solved by a ''fu ndamental'' approach but will need experiments with whole animals coup led with model-building activities.