Experience, tradition and service? Institutionalised R&D in the rangelands

Abstract

This chapter is based on two distinct but related pieces of research. The first is a series of semi-structured interviews conducted with staff from the service organisations with a R&D presence in the Western Division of NSW (NSW Agriculture, the Soil Conservation Service (SCS) and the Western Lands Commission (WLC)). Both field staff (referred to as advisory or extension officers) and managers were interviewed. The second research project involved working with a group of rangeland R&D staff in an attempt to develop a second-order, or co-researching approach to their own work. Chronologically the latter research was initiated after our co-researching project with pastoralists (Chapters 6, 7 and 8) and is not discussed in detail here (see CARR, 1993). However, aspects of it are drawn upon where it illuminates themes which emerged from the interviews