The Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, or Swedish Agricultural University (Swedish: ''Sveriges lantbruksuniversitet'') (SLU) is a

university A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, t ...

Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...

. Although its head office is located in

Ultuna Ultuna () is a locality in Uppsala Municipality, Uppsala County, Sweden with 449 inhabitants in 2017. Located south of central Uppsala, it hosts the headquarters and main campus of the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (Sveriges lant ...

Uppsala Uppsala (, or all ending in , ; archaically spelled ''Upsala'') is the county seat of Uppsala County and the List of urban areas in Sweden by population, fourth-largest city in Sweden, after Stockholm, Gothenburg, and Malmö. It had 177,074 inha ...

, the university has several campuses in different parts of Sweden, the other main facilities being

Alnarp Alnarp () is a village and university campus in Lomma Municipality, Skåne County, Sweden, lying between Lund and Malmö. The first written mention of Alnarp is from 1325. In 1674 it became the official residence of the governor-general of Scani ...

Lomma Municipality Lomma Municipality ( sv, Lomma kommun) is a municipality in Skåne County in southern Sweden, about 10 km north of Malmö. Its seat is located in Lomma with secondary locality Bjärred being of almost equal population size. The present mun ...

Skara Skara is a Urban areas in Sweden, locality and the seat of Skara Municipality, Västra Götaland County, Sweden with 18,580 inhabitants in 2013. Despite its small size, it is one of the oldest cities in Sweden, and has a long educational and ecc ...

, and

Umeå Umeå ( , , , locally ; South Westrobothnian: ;). fi, Uumaja; sju, Ubmeje; sma, Upmeje; se, Ubmi) is a city in northeast Sweden. It is the seat of Umeå Municipality and the capital of Västerbotten County. Situated on the Ume River, Ume� ...

. Unlike other state-owned

universities in Sweden This list of universities in Sweden is based on the Higher Education Ordinance of 1993 (as amended until January 2006). With few exceptions, all higher education in Sweden is publicly funded. The Swedish higher education system differentiates ...

, it is funded through the budget for the Ministry for Rural Affairs. The University was co-founder of the

Euroleague for Life Sciences The Euroleague for Life Sciences (ELLS), established in 2001, is a network of leading universities cooperating in the fields of natural resource management, agricultural and forestry sciences, life sciences, veterinary sciences, food sciences, and ...

(ELLS) which was established in 2001. The university has four faculties: Faculty of

Landscape Planning Landscape planning is a branch of landscape architecture. According to Erv Zube (1931–2002) landscape planning is defined as an activity concerned with developing landscaping amongst competing land uses while protecting natural processes and ...

Horticulture Horticulture is the branch of agriculture that deals with the art, science, technology, and business of plant cultivation. It includes the cultivation of fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, herbs, sprouts, mushrooms, algae, flowers, seaweeds and no ...

and

Agricultural Sciences Agricultural science (or agriscience for short) is a broad multidisciplinary field of biology that encompasses the parts of exact, natural, economic and social sciences that are used in the practice and understanding of agriculture. Profession ...

, Faculty of

Natural Resources Natural resources are resources that are drawn from nature and used with few modifications. This includes the sources of valued characteristics such as commercial and industrial use, aesthetic value, scientific interest and cultural value. O ...

and Agriculture Sciences, Faculty of

Veterinary Medicine Veterinary medicine is the branch of medicine that deals with the prevention, management, diagnosis, and treatment of disease, disorder, and injury in animals. Along with this, it deals with animal rearing, husbandry, breeding, research on nutri ...

and

Animal Science Animal science is described as "studying the biology of animals that are under the control of humankind". It can also be described as the production and management of farm animals. Historically, the degree was called animal husbandry and the ...

and Faculty of Forest Sciences. SLU had in 2020 3155 full-time staff, 4216 full-time students, 559 research students and 191 professors.

History

The university was formed in 1977 by combining three existing separate colleges for veterinary medicine, forestry and agriculture, as well as some smaller units into one organisation in order to improve the efficiency by sharing resources between departments. At the same time, the Veterinary college and Forestry college were moved from

Stockholm Stockholm () is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in Sweden by population, largest city of Sweden as well as the List of urban areas in the Nordic countries, largest urban area in Scandinavia. Approximately 980,000 people liv ...

to Ultuna, which already was the main campus of the Agricultural college. The locations used by the two relocated colleges are today used by the

Stockholm University Stockholm University ( sv, Stockholms universitet) is a public research university in Stockholm, Sweden, founded as a college in 1878, with university status since 1960. With over 33,000 students at four different faculties: law, humanities, so ...

. These colleges had a long history as separate institutions. The Veterinary Institution in

was founded in 1775 and was headed by

Peter Hernqvist Peter may refer to: People * List of people named Peter, a list of people and fictional characters with the given name * Peter (given name) ** Saint Peter (died 60s), apostle of Jesus, leader of the early Christian Church * Peter (surname), a sur ...

, a student of both

Carl von Linné Carl Linnaeus (; 23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after his ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné Blunt (2004), p. 171. (), was a Swedish botanist, zoologist, taxonomist, and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, the ...

and of

Claude Bourgelat Claude Bourgelat (27 March 1712 – 3 January 1779) was a French veterinary surgeon. He was a founder of scientifically informed veterinary medicine, and he created one of the earliest schools for training professional veterinarians. Life a ...

, who founded the first veterinary college in

Lyon Lyon,, ; Occitan: ''Lion'', hist. ''Lionés'' also spelled in English as Lyons, is the third-largest city and second-largest metropolitan area of France. It is located at the confluence of the rivers Rhône and Saône, to the northwest of t ...

in 1762. From 1821 a new veterinary institution in Stockholm took over the training of veterinarians from Skara. The Institute of Forestry was founded in Stockholm in 1828 to provide higher education to those who had gone through practical forestry schools, and was made into a college 1915. An agricultural institute was founded in Ultuna in 1848 and in Alnarp in 1862, under the supervision of the

Royal Swedish Academy of Agriculture The Royal Swedish Academy of Agriculture and Forestry ( sv, Kungliga Skogs- och Lantbruksakademien), formerly the Royal Swedish Academy of Agriculture (''Kungl. Lantbruksakademien''), founded in 1813 at the initiative of Crown Prince Charles, is on ...

, founded in 1813. These institutes, and the experimental activities conducted by the Academy from 1814, were the basis of the Agricultural College, which was created in 1932.

Academics

The ''Journal of Forest Economics'' () was published by

Elsevier Elsevier () is a Dutch academic publishing company specializing in scientific, technical, and medical content. Its products include journals such as ''The Lancet'', ''Cell'', the ScienceDirect collection of electronic journals, '' Trends'', th ...

in affiliation with the Department of Forest Economics. It was founded by Sören Wibe. In 2019, the journal was taken over by Now Publishers. In the 2020

QS World University Ranking ''QS World University Rankings'' is an annual publication of university rankings by Quacquarelli Symonds (QS). The QS system comprises three parts: the global overall ranking, the subject rankings (which name the world's top universities for the ...

, SLU was ranked at 3rd place in the world for the subject Agriculture and Forestry.

Notable alumni

* Professor Anna Tibaijuka –

Tanzania Tanzania (; ), officially the United Republic of Tanzania ( sw, Jamhuri ya Muungano wa Tanzania), is a country in East Africa within the African Great Lakes region. It borders Uganda to the north; Kenya to the northeast; Comoro Islands and ...

n Minister of Lands, Housing and Human Settlements and former Executive Director of UN–HABITAT

History

Academics

Notable alumni

See also