Scientist Profile
Farming leader Dr Robyn Dynes is proof nothing beats experience.
From driving a tractor as a young girl on the family farm in Southland to advising farmers on global trends, best practice and the latest science, trailblazing Robyn has done it all.
“I started my career in a different time. I stepped into a very male-dominated workplace and at Lincoln we were about 25% of the class but probably only 15% of the university.
“My father believed girls could do anything. I was born and bred to farming, and worked shoulder to shoulder with my dad. My approach has always been to get involved.”
And getting involved is exactly what Robyn, a principal scientist at Lincoln specialising in farm systems research, pasture management and farming decisions, does.
“I am passionate about agricultural research and deeply connected to the industry, with good working knowledge of the landscape that is our agricultural sector. I continually seek to understand the challenges facing farmers and the role of science in working with those.
“I’m a connector. If I’m out with my family, it drives them nuts because I’m always meeting people I know, and stopping to chat. And by stopping and having a chat, I get to hear the good and the bad first-hand, and stay connected..”
Robyn was brought up farming the rolling hill country at Arthurton in Southland, north of Gore.
“We were quite small when mum died. We really did do everything with dad. I did a presentation recently and showed a photo of me driving a tractor. I think I'm in year seven. I'm driving down the road and have been feeding-out to sheep.
“The belief girls could do anything meant I had my own lambing beat, I was feeding out hay by myself when I was 11 or 12, I was working in the shearing shed, I was crutching lambs.”
The family shifted to a mixed-cropping farm near Methven when Robyn was a teenager.
“I decided I wanted to learn to plough. Dad said, ‘well I’m going to town, the tractor and the trailer are down the paddock, off you go’,”
Science was a natural fit for Robyn, who did her honours degree at Lincoln College in equine reproduction.
“I was always fascinated by science, and I had some teachers along the way who were inspiring. By nature, I default to the quantitative world. But for me it was agricultural science that held my attention right from the start.
“My first job was as an animal nutritionist for a poultry company. But I soon realised that being a poultry nutritionist was not my lifetime ambition, and came back to Lincoln to do a PhD on the impact of gastrointestinal parasites on feed intake in lambs.”
Before that, she had toyed with the idea of becoming a driver in the standard-bred industry, which she was involved in as an amateur horse-racer and breeder.
Back at Lincoln, she enjoyed the “culture of deep inquiry and critical evaluation”.
“It was the very best training ground for postgraduates. You needed to be able to know your science. And be able to argue for your hypothesis. On the second Thursday of every month we all still get together for a drink.”
1991 was a grim time to finish a PhD and look for work, with an unemployment rate of 11.5%.
“I had a postdoc lined up at the University of Nottingham in the UK, but then fate intervened and I got offered a permanent position with CSIRO Animal Production in Western Australia.”
Dr Robyn Dynes (right) is a regular visitor on farms in New Zealand where she leads engagement and imparts and share scientific knowledge with those who work the land.
That was the start of 14 years in Perth and working in a very different farming environment to Canterbury.
“The farmers of course were like farmers the world over, and even though the key principles and systems are much the same it was in a Mediterranean environment. It’s a very different world, with no effective rainfall from the middle of October until the middle of May. So, when you have children, they don't remember the last time it rained.”
Her work was varied but ended up focusing on the role of livestock in an environmentally challenging region.
“In Western Australia, it was the rapid emergence of secondary salinity with saline pastures. That's a direct outcome of farming practices in the previous 150 years, really, because when Europeans moved to Western Australia, they cleared all the native vegetation for wheat.
“The wheat starts pumping the water before you harvest it in November and then, through the summer, the ground water comes up and brings all the salt, which didn't used to come up because there were big perennial trees on top. Once you get salinity, your crops don’t really grow.
“I led a national programme on this, which would run across Australia. Places like the Murray-Darling Basin have small areas of salinity, and that’s when I discovered the impact of politics on science. Because although the east coast of Australia had fewer problems, it was politically more important because the Murray-Darling supplies the water to big cities.”
Robyn’s experiences across the Tasman, working with agronomists and hydrologists, widened the scope in which she thought about her science.
Shortly after the family’s move back to New Zealand in 2004, she took up a role as a senior scientist in farm systems at AgResearch in Lincoln.
Since then, she has also been a science-impact leader and science-strategy leader for AgResearch, and a member of many advisory bodies, including the Southern Dairy Hub Research Advisory Committee, the Beef and Lamb Farmer Council, the Future Hurunui Governance Group, and the Foundation for Arable Research.
During her time at AgResearch, Robyn says she has moved from working in strategic science to more applied science.
“Most of my research has been on-farm, but in the last 10 years most of what I have been doing is leading bigger research programmes. I’m one of the few people at AgResearch whose passion interests traverse our three main sectors of arable, dairy, and sheep and beef.
Robyn’s is a Board member of Foundation for Arable Research (Independent), member of FAR Research + Development Advisory Group, seconded to B+LNZ Northern South Island Farmer Council and AgResearch representative on Southern Dairy Hub Research Advisory Group.
“The world is changing and in the coming generation we will have an increasing diversity of proteins that people can choose from. It’s happening already – look in many homes and fridges will be full of oat milk and almond milk and soy milk.
“New Zealand's agricultural sectors first need to be profitable, because we farm in a free-market economy so there isn't a subsidy when things don't work out. Secondly, they need to produce food and fibre in a way that will be wanted by our global customers, because they don't need what we produce, but we need them to want it, and that's an important difference.
“As a country we have a nationally declared contribution to global decarbonising, and those signals are now coming through our banking sector. So, this is the first generation of farmers who are having to produce to a set of specifications determined by others in a way they haven't had to previously.”
Good communication is the platform for a science career, Robyn believes.
“We need to create space for the voice of science when it comes to farming and help the public understand the complexities and the challenges our rural communities face.
“I’ve just finished leading the National Science Challenge Whitiwhiti Ora-Our Land and Water. I think it is probably my proudest moment.
“This is all about the future of our land uses, and I had to provide leadership and advocacy for a really diverse range of people, working with some of today’s most outstanding scientists.
“I’m just so proud of what we’ve achieved. Winning the Bledisloe Medal was a thrill and provided my colleagues and supporters with a sense of satisfaction that the work we do is making an impact.
