2025 is a landmark year for the RAU as we turn 180.
To celebrate this historic milestone, we will be hosting a number of events throughout the year alongside our usual University calendar.
These will include a series of 180th lectures on the challenges and opportunities facing our environment, farming, food and water security, and land management, as well as a community Open Day on Saturday 13 September to coincide with the date our first students were admitted in 1845.
We hope that our alumni, friends and supporters will join our staff and students for our celebrations throughout 2025.
You can read more about our history as the first agricultural college in the English-speaking world.
You can find out more about the calendar of events below. This will be updated with further events as they are confirmed and tickets can be booked by clicking on the link.
180th Lecture Series
| Date | Time | Lecture | Venue |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wednesday, 2 April 2025 | 6:00pm - 8:00pm |
'Cerealsly' Rethinking Arable Growing Systems. Delivered by Nicola Cannon, Professor of Agriculture at the Royal Agricultural University and Andy Cato, Wildfarmed co-founder. This deep dive into modern arable farming methods sees Andy and Nicola Cannon explore from two completely different perspectives how research and practical farming examples are moving towards regenerative, agroecology farming systems function. They will explore the opportunities of bicropping, reducing the intensity of tillage, grazing cereals with sheep, different weed control techniques and evaluating this range of techniques. Each speaker will discuss the opportunities and challenges of trying to reduce reliance on external inputs in agriculture and how this can become an integrated into agricultural practices to deal help develop environmentally acceptable farming solutions. |
RAU campus, Boutflour Hall |
| Wednesday, 11 June 2025 | 6:00pm - 8:00pm |
Transatlantic Paradigms and Policy and Animal Welfare: A case study in global policy. Delivered by Clare Thorpe, Professor of Business and Innovation, and David Main, Professor of Production Animal Health and Welfare, both at the Royal Agricultural University. Come along to hear two intriguing lectures on the influence of global policy relating to food systems and animal welfare. |
RAU campus, Kenneth Russell Room |
| Wednesday, 16 July | 6:00pm - 8:00pm |
Dancing with Daffodils. The lecture will be delivered by Kevin Stephens, CEO of Agroceutical Products Ltd, along with Xianmin Chang, Associate Pro Vice-Chancellor (China Programmes) at Royal Agricultural University They will explore the pitfalls and opportunities of developing new commercial markets for field scale crops, using the development story of hill farm production of daffodils to provide bio-active compounds to the pharma and ag-chem industries. |
RAU campus, Kenneth Russell Room |
| Wednesday, 10 September | 6:00pm - 8:00pm |
Our Future in the Land. Presented by Professor Tom MacMillan and Sue Pritchard, Chief Executive of the Food, Farming and Countryside Commission (FFCC) |
TBC |
| Wednesday, 22 October | 6:00pm - 8:00pm |
Making Farming Buzz Again. Delivered by Professor Duncan Westbury and Ann Conquest, LUC, Associate Director, Rural Land Management |
TBC |
| Wednesday, 12 November | 6:00pm - 8:00pm |
Water, Wastewater, everywhere… Every Drop Counts! Delivered by Professor Kiran Tota-Maharaj and Andrew Blackhall, CEO Water Research Centre |
TBC |
