College News

Ph.D. programs in CAMS

Marking another milestone in its progress towards becoming an academic and research institution of excellence, the College of Agricultural & Marine Sciences (CAMS) at Sultan Qaboos University is set to introduce Ph.D. programs this year.

The proposed programs will build on the masters' programs that have been running for nine years and will complete the hierarchy of academic programs offered by the college. The major objective of the PhD programs is to offer advanced research training in agricultural, marine and food sciences in order to build capacity in the Sultanate. Initially the Ph.D. programs will be offered by four departments, Soils, Water & Agricultural Engineering, Food Science & Nutrition, Crop Sciences and Marine Science & Fisheries. Other departments in the College will follow later.

The College has all the necessary resources to offer doctoral programs, including excellent laboratory facilities, the agricultural experiment station and a research vessel. With the introduction of these new advanced programs the College will have further improved library facilities, technical support and streamlining of procurement procedures for research materials.

The PhD programs in the college will follow the research model and be based on a research thesis. This model is widely used in the UK, European countries, Australia, South Africa and elsewhere. It is expected that doctoral programs, implemented to the highest academic standards, would enhance the capability of the college in addressing the national and regional issues of sustainable development in the fields of agricultural and marine sciences.

The implementation of the new programs will also reduce Oman nationals' current dependence on foreign institutions for PhD studies. Specializations available for PhD programs include water resource management, ground water, irrigation, agricultural engineering, post-harvest technology, food engineering, food processing, food safety, human nutrition, plant pathology, entomology, horticulture, plant biotechnology, plant breeding, agronomy, marine science, fisheries and coastal ecology.

The Ph.D. programs will include at least three years of full time supervised research. Other requirements include the presentation of a detailed proposal, seminars and acceptance of at least one paper for publication in an international journal. Students may be expected to spend a semester abroad working with an external supervisor in order to broaden their experience. The students seeking admission should possess a masters' degree from a recognized university and have a strong academic record.

The College of Agricultural & Marine Sciences enjoys the highest per capita research support and research output at Sultan Qaboos University and more than half of the faculty already have supervisory experience in doctoral programs.

The College of Agricultural & Marine Sciences was one of the founding colleges at the opening of Sultan Qaboos University in 1986. The main themes of the college have always been food production and environment sustainability. Over the 22 years since its inception, the College has grown and diversified, with well established programs now covering the agricultural, marine and food science disciplines in eight masters' programs and 10 undergraduate majors. At present, the student intake is above 300 annually and the total student strength is above one thousand.

The College has an outstanding research record also. Research based publications, levels of funding from the internal and external grants and contractual research activities are amongst the highest in the university and are competitive with overseas universities. Most recently the UNESCO Chair in Marine Biotechnology has been established in the College and it is anticipated that major multi-disciplinary research activities will be developed in this field of science.

(Source: SQU Newsletter)