June 15th was Stewart Coventry’s last day with the University of Adelaide. Stewart’s contribution has been significant with more than 15 years’ service as a staff member. In this time he played a pivotal role in what was the barley breeding program. Among Stewart’s achievements are the contributions to the development of many successful barley varieties (including Compass, Commander, Fathom, and Fleet – among others); and as a co-author on several important peer-reviewed journal publications whether they were field, quality and/or molecular marker-based. From an industry perspective, Stewart actively engaged with many stakeholders whether small, medium or large enterprises – national or international.
On behalf of the Department of Agricultural Science (and more broadly the School), we wish Stewart all the best and thank him sincerely for all he has done while he has been an employee of the University. Stewart commences duties with AGT in late June as one of their barley breeders. This will be a rewarding and challenging career opportunity at Australia’s largest, and most successful, plant breeding company. Stewart will have visitor status at the University and move to affiliate status in time, so we as a research community that remains heavily involved in plant breeding and plant breeding research, can still access his expertise – whether that be in the form of collaboration and/or student supervision.
Stewart Coventry (front, centre) and members of the Dapartment of Agricultural Science at a farewell morning tea