Long after reaching retirement age, I continue as non-executive director and chair of several companies and charities. My professional life involved initial qualification as an animal parasitologist in the government veterinary service and later as a fish pathologist in the government fisheries service.

My Fellowship involved me travelling to North America to study diseases in fish. At the time this was a largely unknown discipline in Europe but rather better studied in the United States, where the first fish virus had been identified only a couple of years earlier. I studied at the Department of the Interior fish disease laboratories (now 'fish health' laboratories) on the east and west coasts, as well as travelling widely around fish-production facilities, both public and private.

On my return to the UK, I formed a consultancy business that expanded into research and development as aquaculture expanded, and eventually resulted in the formation of over 40 businesses on five continents. All involved the interface between land and the sea and most involved fish production. The group of companies was sold after 25 years and I developed a new business assisting commercialisation of university research output.