TUESDAY 1 MAY 2007

PROFESSOR SIR HOWARD DALTON, MR TREVOR GUYMER, DR PHILIP NEWTON AND DR MIKE WEBB

  Q60  Chairman: Do you get access to all that data, in terms of sea-bed tracking; because they do a huge amount of work?

  Professor Sir Howard Dalton: I am sure those data are available somewhere. I know, for example, when I was down in the Antarctic, the Royal Navy was involved in being able to do contour mapping of the sea-bed and that information is available, yes.

  Q61  Linda Gilroy: There is a good link with the Met Office; is there a similar link with the Hydrographic Office, which is an MoD agency as well as the Met Office being an MoD agency?

  Professor Sir Howard Dalton: I cannot speak on behalf of the Hydrographic Office. I do not know quite where they fit into this. Maybe you ought to ask them.

  Q62  Chairman: We are going to.

  Dr Newton: Just to answer your more general question, what are the known unknowns. I guess, from NERC's point of view, for the strategic investments that we make, we find that out by conducting a review of our marine investments and then asking our main strategic suppliers to identify what is required in the national context, then testing that by national and international peer review of scientists and users. We would say, at this moment in time, the known unknowns that we want to know now are in Oceans 2025. We must not be complacent about that; we have got to keep revisiting that question. That would be my overall answer to your question. Because we also fund a lot of responsive mode, blue skies science, then of course we do not feel that we always need to be able to identify things that we need to do in such a specific way. We need there to be mechanisms just for taking excellent proposals in any area of marine science.

  Q63  Chris Mole: Can I follow that up by asking you and Dr Webb what guarantees NERC can give for sustained funding for surveys such as the Continuous Plankton Recorder, which we saw in Plymouth, and similar, long-term, because there seems to be enormous value in that long-term analysis of these oceans?

  Dr Webb: Phil did tell you about national capability, and the main role for national capability is to ensure that there is sustainable funding for these critical, long-term time series. Of course there will be an element of review but it will be over a much longer time period, so it might be in ten or 12 years' time the time series of, say, the Sir Alister Hardy Foundation for Ocean Science will be looked at; but it is an opportunity as well for that time series maybe to make the case for more money. There will be an element of review and it will be over longer periods of time.

  Chairman: That sounded just like the Rumsfeld episode. That was very well done, Professor Newton.

  Q64  Dr Spink: Mr Guymer, the Joint Nature Conservation Committee commented that, and I quote: "The paucity of biological data sets is hampering our ability to assess and interpret changes resulting from climate change." You have already said quite a bit about the availability of data sets, but there are massive data sets around the world; do you have sufficient access, is there sufficient exchange of data sets internationally: what is your view?

  Mr Guymer: There is an intergovernmental mechanism which is set up, called the International Oceanographic Data and Information Exchange Programme, and that comes under the auspices of the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission, which is the competent body, in UN terminology, for this. There has been a real effort, over quite a period of time, to pull together the various national and regional efforts which have been going on.

  Q65  Dr Spink: They are organised under UNESCO, are they not?

  Mr Guymer: They are, under UNESCO, yes.

  Q66  Dr Spink: Is it working, the IOC (not the Olympics but Oceanographic)?

  Mr Guymer: I can speak to that, because in addition to my role as Secretary of IACMST I lead the UK delegation to IOC. There is an issue here. IOC has evolved into not only doing the underpinning science but also in developing these operational systems, both in terms of data collection and the data management, and there is a tension, which is growing, between that role and the wider role of UNESCO. Certainly this is a feeling among a number of Member States, and my understanding is that this is going to begin to come to a head. Member States are going to be asked to consider various possibilities about the future of IOC within the UNESCO system; is it best served by being within it, or should there be some alternative. I would contrast the position of IOC with that of WMO, the World Meteorological Organisation, which of course also is a UN body but does not sit under an umbrella body like UNESCO. There is a direct correspondence between marine science and meteorological science and so I think that this whole issue is being pointed up at the moment.

  Q67  Dr Spink: Thank you very much for that. It is self-evident, of course, that international collaboration on a subject like oceans is absolutely essential. What are NERC and IACMST doing to promote UK marine research in the international arena?

  Dr Webb: At the current time, NERC has large investments in directed programmes which have collaborative elements, so within the Rapid Climate Change Programme, which NERC runs, we have got an array across the North Atlantic, which is funded jointly with the US. The US also provides ship time to support that array and so, with the co-ordinated programme between the US and NERC, we can support a very large observing system which, arguably, the US or the UK, in their own right, could not support. Also though we have investments, for example, we have an observatory on the Cape Verde Islands, it is an atmospheric observatory, with an oceanic observatory, and, through co-operation with the Germans and the US, once again, we are able to put all of the elements in place for that ocean and atmospheric observatory, and hopefully ensure, over the longer term, that remains in place in a part of the world which is very sensitive to climate change, and, with joint funding, hopefully we will keep that going for many years to come. On ships, it is very noticeable, if you look at NERC's Cruise programme, that there is a large amount of co-operation embedded within the NERC Cruise programme. In terms of NERC's barter arrangements, you may or may not be aware that we have exchange arrangements with six partners, and hopefully one more shortly, and that allows for exchange of ship time without exchange of funding. What that allows NERC to do is operate on a worldwide basis, even though UK ships do not generally go out of the North Atlantic, or the South Atlantic, or the Indian Ocean. An example of where that can lead; we funded a large consortium off Sumatra to look at the earthquake zone where the tsunami was generated, it is in a part of the world to which NERC has not sent ships for years, but through these barter exchange arrangements the Germans have provided 130 days of ship time to do geophysics off Sumatra. No money has been exchanged between NERC and the Germans but, in return, an example of what NERC will give the Germans is we will be in the Pacific early next year so we will do a geophysics experiment for the Germans, in return, off Chile. It is a hugely cost-effective way of using these large facilities, and the level of co-operation, I think it is fair to say, has increased markedly over the last five to six years, to such an extent now that I think we can push even further and maybe start thinking about sharing facilities, be they big ocean observatories or the actual ships themselves. We are really building momentum in this area.

  Mr Guymer: I could build on what I said earlier about the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission. Recently, it has been conducting a review of its Ocean Sciences programme and the UK has contributed ideas to that. Of course, in contributing ideas to it, we try also to get convergence with the UK national programme as well. We have been feeding very much into that. That is the intergovernmental process, which, as we all know, can be rather a slow process. Some years ago, the partnership in observing the global ocean, POGO, was set up to link the major oceanographic institutions of the world, and in particular to bring the directors and the senior staff of those institutes together to try to facilitate what was happening at the intergovernmental level. The UK was one of the founder members of that. I have attended several meetings to get cross-fertilisation with the intergovernmental process. In both of those ways, those mechanisms, I think we can advance international marine science and make sure that the UK is playing a key role, and I think in those arenas we do punch above our weight; it is not only to do with the financial resources, it is to do with our ideas, our intellectual capabilities.

  Q68  Dr Spink: As in many areas, thankfully. Philip, are there any particular concerns regarding our link-ups with the US?

  Dr Newton: Certainly, from the links that I am aware of, it is all extremely positive. For the Rapid Climate Change programme, to which Dr Webb has just referred, that involved sort of a strategic partnership, whereby we undertook, researchers on both sides, in both countries, writing complementary proposals, a joint review process, by common reviewers, a joint decision-making panel; it was a very positive relationship with National Science Foundation. Some of that work is funded by NOAA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration; again, very positive interactions, a lot of good work and funding coming for most of the programme.

  Q69  Dr Spink: Is our international collaboration, particularly with the US, getting better, or getting worse?

  Professor Sir Howard Dalton: I can answer one part of that, and maybe Phil will want to talk a little bit more about NERC's role specifically. Yesterday, for example, I was speaking in the Royal Society to a meeting which was organised between the UK, the Natural Environment Research Council, and the National Science Foundation in the US, and, in fact, the US sent over to this country, I think, about 15 of their scientists to be actively engaged in this meeting and make some major contributions, all on seas, which is where they are making a major contribution.

  Q70  Dr Spink: Why I ask, Howard, is that Plymouth told the Committee that there was decreasing ease with which it was possible to work with colleagues in the USA. I just wonder why?

  Professor Sir Howard Dalton: I do not know why, because, in fact, this meeting was organised by Ian Joint, who is at the Plymouth Marine Laboratory; so I do not understand that statement at all. Maybe you have picked up on one person's involvement; but, very often, certainly in my view, we have had quite good relationships with the United States in a number of different areas, particularly in the marine environment. There are major laboratories in the United States which are working collaboratively with us; if you look at Woods Hole, if you look at Scrips, there is a lot of activity going on between the two.

  Linda Gilroy: Can I say, Chairman, I looked at that comment and wondered if we had picked that up correctly, because my recollection was that they were saying almost it was easier to collaborate with European and US colleagues than it was with UK colleagues.

  Q71  Chairman: Collaborate internationally?

  Professor Sir Howard Dalton: I think probably that is true.

  Q72  Dr Spink: I am glad you have cleared that up for us, Howard; thank you very much. I phrased my question carefully because I was not at the meeting so I did not hear the comment. There are many facets of research in the ocean; there is impact on climate, there is biodiversity, there is mineral extraction, all of that, there is navigation, there is coastal erosion. Do you find that particular countries have particular areas of specialisation, or that there is easier research in certain areas, easier collaboration in certain areas rather than others? For instance, are we all collaborating very freely on climate but being very protective in terms of fish stocks, for instance? Do you find any differences?

  Professor Sir Howard Dalton: Certainly there are areas where there is good international collaboration; on climate change there is no doubt that there is, we are all extremely good at sharing information with each other. It is a global problem and we all contribute dramatically to that. When it comes to things like biodiversity of the oceans as well, there again I think there are very good levels of collaboration. I suspect that we punch well above our weight there also.

  Q73  Dr Spink: If I could interrupt you; on the biodiversity, on fish stocks, do you not find that nations get a bit protective about their own fish stocks and they are fishing and exploiting it?

  Professor Sir Howard Dalton: Of course; naturally.

  Q74  Dr Spink: They do not want to share that data with others, so that they can do what they have to do economically?

  Professor Sir Howard Dalton: I think probably you are right, and intuitively I am sure you are. I do not know the detail sufficiently to be able to tell you how much individual countries become protective about their environment, when it comes to fish stocks. It is a very, very difficult one. I know, in the European Union, there is a lot of debate, as you may well know, and our Fisheries Minister spends a lot of time discussing all of that, but that is wearing my Defra hat and not my IACMST hat. There is a lot of good, shared information and resource, and science is very much like that, as you know; it is very much at the international area, but there are areas where there is probably some limited sharing of information. When you talk about flood and coastal management, that is peculiar to the United Kingdom, we have to work towards that particular goal. When it looks at aggregate mining, again, that is something very much to do with the UK. I think there are areas of research where we collaborate very well, where we need to; in others areas, it is not necessarily very important to do so.

  Mr Guymer: There is an interesting issue there which arose with the UN, at its General Assembly, calling for the establishment of a global marine assessment, and probably that is the closest that we will come, in our lifetime, to the equivalent of the IPCC arrangement for climate. The consensus was broken by Iceland, which would not allow this to go ahead if it included living marine resources, which made a nonsense of the whole thing, really. Happily, that has been resolved, to the extent that, although Iceland are not part of that, they have stood to one side; but that is an example where a particular nation's political will and stance can endanger a whole international activity.

  Dr Spink: Thank you very much indeed.

  Q75  Linda Gilroy: Just on international collaboration, we have talked a lot about Europe and the US, which are the countries which stand out in your minds, outside of those arenas, which if not punching above their weight certainly are making significant contributions in the international collaborations in science?

  Dr Webb: My impression is that clearly India and China are up and coming and it is inevitable that there are going to be huge amounts of collaboration in future. I say `inevitable'. The interactions are starting already through the POGO initiative which Trevor talked about earlier.

  Q76  Linda Gilroy: Australia?

  Dr Webb: After that, Australia is the one nation which springs to mind, and Japan, of course.

  Q77  Chairman: I was particularly interested in this issue of international co-operation, and particularly the use of ships from other nations, not to buy time but to barter time on those. Would it be possible for you to give us a note on that, because we have not got any written evidence on it?

  Dr Webb: Absolutely; yes.

  Q78  Chairman: Thank you very much indeed, because it was a really interesting comment you made.

  Dr Webb: There are a very brief couple of lines in the NERC evidence, but it is a very small amount.

  Chairman: Yes; but it was a very interesting point you were making and I think it will be something perhaps to include in our report.

  Q79  Linda Gilroy: In some of the evidence we have received, several submissions have mentioned the skills base for marine science weakening to the point where some specialities are being lost, and particularly taxonomy has been mentioned, difficulties with recruiting numerate PhD, post-doctoral staff, as an ongoing problem, and perhaps deep-sea biology. What are IACMST and NERC strategies to ensure that there are the necessary skills?

  Dr Webb: I would start by making the point that NERC has tried actively to encourage engagement between its researchers and the university sector, to try to stimulate the younger students to come through to fill some of these gaps. As part of the evidence for that, the Proudman Oceanographic Laboratory has moved from Bidston to Liverpool, within the University of Liverpool; of course, in Southampton University, we have the National Oceanography Centre, which was moved down from IOS, the Institute for Oceanographic Science, at Wormley. Also we have the Sea Mammal Research Unit, which has moved from Cambridge up to St Andrew's University. We have tried to stimulate interest in the marine sciences and attract students to fill these gaps that way. In terms of the skills gap, clearly the research councils are aware there are issues; attracting highly numerate scientists to the environmental sciences is an ongoing issue. In the past, NERC and the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council funded an environmental maths and stats programme, which provided £3½ million worth of funding to target studentships at this area and then, hopefully, keep them on this career path, which would allow them then to move on to, let us say, the oceanic modelling, which is another area of weakness which we know about, within that. As part of NERC's emerging strategy, we will be looking to do a gap analysis when it comes to skills and to target these areas in ways which might include, as I said before, the environmental maths and stats course, so specifically target these areas.

  Professor Sir Howard Dalton: I could say something very briefly about it, because it is not a major activity of ours in IACMST, we concentrate more on trying to stimulate the activities between given government departments. It was true that the precursor to IACMST, the CCMST as it was in those days, did recognise this as an issue, and that the skills base, even then, was being somewhat eroded, and tried to stimulate industry to try to interact much more with the higher education institutions so that there could be a more active engagement for the universities to have an identification of the sorts of needs that it would have and the skills it would require in the future. That is still an issue and it is still something that IACMST talked a little bit about, but it is not very high up on the agenda, I am afraid.

  Mr Guymer: IACMST does engage in some discussions with representatives of industry, and recently we have had the Institute for Marine Engineering, Science and Technology join as full members of IACMST, and talking with them and the Marine Information Alliance we have identified not only that some skills which were needed in the past have declined but also that there are emerging needs, particularly surrounding the area of operational oceanography, where we are not well placed to provide the sorts of skills which industry perceives that it needs. We have been discussing with those bodies how we should address that, probably initially with a working group, which pulls together NERC and those industry bodies, and indeed government departments, the Met Office, to discuss this. What we have done also is have a meeting involving representatives of industry and the National Oceanography Centre, which of course is embedded within a university environment, and specifically we discussed how we might set up an MSc in Operational Oceanography; so those discussions are ongoing. I think those are indicative of the kind of facilitating role which IACMST can play just to help meet the emerging needs. We need to have a better understanding of industry's and government departments' present needs and what they anticipate they are going to be in the next ten to 20 years, and then establish a strategy to meet those.