The Courier & Advertiser (Perth and Perthshire Edition)
SRUC hails positive year
Scotland’s Rural College (SRUC) has hailed a positive financial year despite the challenges posed by the Covid-19 crisis.
The rural college, which runs campuses across Scotland, says Covid-19 mitigation measures helped deliver an operating surplus of £900,000 for the year to March 31 2021.
The latest accounts also show a drop in revenue with SRUC reporting a total comprehensive loss of £3.6 million, compared to income of £3.8m the year before.
SRUC said a switch to bed and breakfast-style accommodation for students to book short stays on campus during the pandemic, along with lower research income, led to a decrease in revenue.
However, it said a 10.5% increase in student applications and reduced operating costs as a result of fewer people being on campus helped offset these losses.
“Despite the challenges of Covid-19, we ended the year in a strong position financially,” said SRUC chief executive and principal, Professor Wayne Powell.
“The balance sheet remains strong with £27m of cash and short-term investments at year-end and an underlying net surplus of £0.1m is ahead of the prior year which, given the impact of the pandemic, is an exceptional result.”
He paid tribute to the college’s workforce – which stood at an average of 1,105 full-time equivalents during the year – and said: “The character, resilience, flexibility and commitment of my colleagues over the past 15 months has been outstanding and has been the cornerstone of the successes recorded in this annual report.”
The accounts also reveal a £3.7m increase in SRUC’S total pension liability to £27.7m – an increase the college attributed to its four final salary pension schemes.
SRUC said its commercial arm – SAC Commercial – continued to achieve a profitable trading position.
The college said: “Although the operating profit of £1.2m was around £700,000 down on the previous year, operational cost savings and the innovative work of the veterinary services lab at the Pentland Science Park, which was utilised as a Covid-19 testing facility for NHS Lothian, helped to mitigate losses.”