STRI (Sports Turf Research Institute) Bulletin Jan 2014 | Page 4

FIRST WORD
Gordon McKillop
Chief Executive, STRI

So another year has passed and we are
all a little bit older and hopefully a little
bit wiser too. It has been a busy year
for us, with many projects both at home
and in far flung corners of the world. In
the UK and Ireland we are still heavily
involved at events and venues like The
Open, Wimbledon, Royal Ascot, Lord’s,
Croke Park and the RDS. We also have
new involvement in the development of
pitches at venues like the London Olympic
Stadium, London Irish and at Brighton
and Hove Albion FC. Overseas we were
heavily involved in, for example, the FIFA
Confederations Cup in Brazil, The U17
World Cup in UAE and the FIFA World
Club Championships in Morocco. We even
provided consultancy visits to prestigious
tennis clubs in the New York area!
Opening an office and research facilities
in Brisbane was another major step for
us in 2013. This will facilitate conducting
R&D into warm season grasses and assist
in the delivery of our consultancy services
in the entire Australasian region, not just
Australia. For example, we are already

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Bulletin January 2014 Issue 264

working closely with a consultancy
business in Japan and in Australia itself
we have won the contract to prepare
pitches for the 2015 Asian Nations
Cup to be held there. This football
tournament is the equivalent of the
UEFA EURO Championships held every
four years within Europe. So there is
good progress down under too.
Other achievements have included
winning the SME Export Business of
the Year from British Expertise from
the work we did in EURO 2012 and
we were also in the top three small
businesses of the year in Yorkshire and
Humberside in the annual competition
run by the Yorkshire Post. We also
completed our rebuilding programme
with the construction of a major new
maintenance facility for the machinery
on our trials grounds. And last but not
least, we were awarded ISO 18001 for
the way in which we manage our Health
and Safety processes to go alongside
ISO 9001 for Quality and 14001 for
Environmental Management which we

obtained in 2012. So all in all, a busy
and productive year.
So life remains hectic and will be
particularly so in the coming year during
the FIFA World Cup in Brazil, which will
have a variety of challenges for our staff
to manage. We will also be launching at
BTME our new STRI Turf Management
Programme, with more information on this
included in this edition of the Bulletin. Also
at BTME, the format of our annual Golf
Environment Competition has changed,
in discussion with our sponsors, so that,
unlike previous years, the winners are
actually announced on the night from a
shortlist of finalists. So a bit of tension will
be added to the awards dinner! Again there
is more information on the competition and
finalists in this edition of the Bulletin.
Finally, can I wish you all a prosperous