Cathal McCarron, from Dromore left Belfast recently on an 11 week worldwide study investigating Bio-fuels and the Carbon Footprint of Agriculture.

Cathal has been awarded a Nuffield Farming Scholarship, supported by The Thomas Henry Foundation, to finance his studies.

Cathal is a past engineering student from the South West Regional College at Omagh. He graduated in 2004 from Harper Adams University in Shropshire with a degree in agricultural engineering with marketing and management. As an integral part of his course he worked for 12 months in the European Headquarters of John Deere at Mannheim, Germany. In the final year of his course he was awarded the John Thompson and Sons Ltd. Victor Truesdale Memorial Prize, the premier student award at Harper Adams University College.

On graduating, Cathal was appointed deputy machinery editor of the Farmers' Weekly and was based in Surrey for three years. He returned to Northern Ireland 12 months ago and now writes freelance.

His Nuffield Farming Scholarship study of the carbon footprint of agriculture and of bio fuels will take him to Brazil, Argentina, USA, Australia and India.