Scotland's Rural College (SRUC) 

Scotland’s Rural College (SRUC) is one of Europe’s leading land-based institutions, with a heritage going back over 100 years. SRUC Veterinary Services is the largest provider of livestock health schemes in the UK.

With around 7,300 farmers and livestock keeper members, health schemes have transformed animal health and welfare, contributing hundreds of millions of pounds to the economy through improving productivity.

SRUC’s flagship initiative is the Premium Cattle Health Scheme that has national and international impact in helping to eradicate Bovine Viral Diarrhoea (BVD), one of the major cattle diseases that causes slower growth rates, increased susceptibility to other diseases and raised mortality rates. The modelling and analytical work carried out by our researchers is regularly cited as an example of best practice in its field.

As well as contributing to animal health and welfare and providing vital support to industry, our veterinary services have also had political impact by providing the underpinning technical frameworks for sheep and goat exports to Northern Ireland post-EU Exit.

The veterinary services team is supported by our central state-of-the-art laboratory and network of regional facilities which can process up to one million samples per year. These came into their own during the COVID pandemic when the molecular biology facility was re-purposed for testing for human samples of coronavirus.