Sustainable Agriculture and Food Security MRes

Please rest assured we make all reasonable efforts to provide you with the programmes, services and facilities described. However, it may be necessary to make changes due to significant disruption, for example in response to Covid-19.

View our Academic experience page, which gives information about your Newcastle University study experience for the academic year 2022-23.

See our terms and conditions and student complaints information, which gives details of circumstances that may lead to changes to programmes, modules or University services.

Module information is intended to provide an example of what you will study.

Our teaching is informed by research. Course content changes periodically to reflect developments in the discipline, the requirements of external bodies and partners, and student feedback.

Full details of the modules on offer will be published through the Programme Regulations and Specifications ahead of each academic year. This usually happens in May.

Optional modules availability

Some courses have optional modules. Student demand for optional modules may affect availability.

To find out more please see our terms and conditions.

This course is taught in four-week teaching blocks.

You'll be taught through:

• lectures
• seminars
• practical and field classes
• tutorials
• case studies
• small group discussions

We expect you to undertake independent study outside of these structured sessions.

We offer flexible learning for those already working in industry through the Credit Accumulation Transfer Scheme. This framework enables us to award postgraduate-level qualifications using credit-bearing stand-alone modules as 'building blocks' towards a qualification. This means that the credits from modules undertaken within a five-year period can be 'banked' towards the award of a qualification.

Depending on your modules, you'll be assessed through a combination of:

• Case study
• Computer assessment
• Dissertation
• Essay
• Oral examination
• Oral presentation
• Report
• Research proposal
• Written examination
• Written exercise

Project work

You'll be supported through training in designing and delivering a project based on a laboratory or field-based investigation. After choosing your topic you'll collect, analyse and interpret data to produce a thesis reporting your investigation and results in a critical manner.

Our mission is to help you:

• stay healthy, positive and feeling well
• overcome any challenges you may face during your degree – academic or personal
• get the most out of your postgraduate research experience
• carry out admin and activities essential to progressing through your degree
• understand postgraduate research processes, standards and rules

We can offer you tailored wellbeing support, courses and activities.

You can also access a broad range of workshops covering:

• research and professional skills
• careers support
• wellbeing
• health and safety
• public engagement
• academic development

Dr Hannah Davis is the Degree Programme Director and an experienced researcher in the area of ruminant nutrition and grazing management. Hannah's research aims to understand how dairy management practices affect milk quality, animal health and environmental impact with a view to optimising sustainable farming systems.

You can also view staff profiles related to research in Agricultural Production.

Our lecturers are industry experienced and research active. Our research in integrated agricultural production focuses on:

• soil science
• plant science
• ecology
• dairy and beef production

Our research spans a range of scales, from pot – plot – farm – landscape.

Strategic research embraces work on:

• soil quality
• rhizosphere function
• plant-soil feedback
• soil-carbon dynamics
• nutrient cycling
• sustainable livestock

Applied research addresses issues of:

• climate change mitigation (including biofuels)
• ecological (organic) farming systems
• low-input crop systems
• agriculture-environment interactions

From 1 January 2021 there is an update to the way professional qualifications are recognised by countries outside of the UK

Check the government’s website for more information.

If your studies last longer than one year, your tuition fee may increase in line with inflation.

Depending on your residency history, if you’re a student from the EU, other EEA or a Swiss national, with settled or pre-settled status under the EU Settlement Scheme, you’ll normally pay the ‘Home’ tuition fee rate and may be eligible for Student Finance England support.

EU students without settled or pre-settled status will normally be charged fees at the ‘International’ rate and will not be eligible for Student Finance England support.

If you are unsure of your fee status, check out the latest guidance here.

Scholarships

We support our EU and international students by providing a generous range of Vice-Chancellor's automatic and merit-based scholarships. See our searchable postgraduate funding page for more information. 

If you are an international student or a student from the EU, EEA or Switzerland and you need a visa to study in the UK, you may have to pay a deposit.

You can check this in the How to apply section.

If you're applying for funding, always check the funding application deadline. This deadline may be earlier than the application deadline for your course.

For some funding schemes, you need to have received an offer of a place on a course before you can apply for the funding.