Dairy innovation centre plans submitted

The industry is already a major driver for the economy in south west Scotland and Cumbria

Plans have been submitted to create a dairy innovation centre near Dumfries.

It will run alongside a multi-million pound project aimed at creating up to 600 new jobs across south west Scotland and Cumbria.

Scotland's Rural College (SRUC), which is leading the scheme, has lodged proposals for the centre at its Barony Campus at Parkgate.

The "digital dairy" project landed more than £21m in funding support last year.

As well as looking at creating new products and new ways of working it will seek to reduce the amount of greenhouse gases produced by the industry.

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The scheme involves a wide range of educational and dairy organisations and hopes to increase the role of the dairy sector as a major employer and economic driver in the area.

The new innovation centre would be home to about 60 staff - 15 of them new - on the Barony site.

It has been used to provide agricultural education since the mid-1950s when its "farm school" opened.

Since then it has developed into a college offering qualifications in a wide range of subjects including fish farming, forestry, animal care and veterinary nursing.

A design statement for the plans for the new innovation centre said it had been developed to ensure it did not detrimentally impact on its current surroundings.