Day 1 :
Keynote Forum
Mohammad Babadoost
University of Illinois, USA
Keynote: Improving crop production in developing countries
Time : 00:00
Biography:
Mohammad Babadoost completed his Ph.D. in plant pathology at North Carolina State University. In 1999, he joined the faculty of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where he is now a Professor of Plant Pathology and Extension Specialist. Mohammad conducts research and extension programs on the biology and management of vegetable and fruit crops diseases, and teaches “Plant Disease Diagnosis and Management.” He has served as an editor of several peer-reviewed journal in the United States and worldwide. Dr. Babadoost has 53 peer-reviewed and more 300 extension articles. He has developed a profound commitment for establishing food security in the world.
Abstract:
According to the reports by the United Nations, more than 800 million people in the world in 2016 were chronically undernourished. To improve food security, establishing sustainable food crop production in the world is essential. Despite losing some of the productive agricultural lands to urban developments throughout the world, there are still considerable land areas with plenty of water that can be utilized for production of food crops. However, despite vast efforts on plant protection, more than 30% of food crops and products are lost to plant pests (diseases, insects, and weeds). The losses are much higher in the developing countries than developed countries. To improve crop production and minimize the losses, establishing/strengthening national agricultural programs is essential. Productive agricultural programs require strong teaching, research, and extension establishments in every nation. Problem-solving in every area of the world should be based on the credible local research, complimented with credible and timely information-delivery to the end users. External helps are valuable, but they will be more productive if the helpers have satisfactory knowledge of the ethnical cultures of the assigned areas. Despite of the tremendous international efforts, effective problem-solving in production of food crops in the developing countries will be achieved by training local experts on teaching, research, and extension is agricultural disciplines.
Keynote Forum
Nityananda Khanal
Agriculture and Agri Food Canada, Canada
Keynote: Adaptive but static: seed yield responses of creeping red fescue (Festuca rubra L. ssp. rubra) to environmental and management factors in the peace river region of western Canada
Time : 00:00
Biography:
Nityananda Khanal is a Forage Research Scientist at Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada. He has his expertise in the agronomy of forage, field and horticultural crops with diverse work experience from tropical to temperate region, from subsistence-oriented to mechanized industrial production systems from Canada, Thailand and Nepal. His current research focuses on developing crop management practices for enhancing seed yield and quality of forage seed crops and designing cropping systems with a rational integration of perennial forage seed and annual food crops.
Abstract:
Peace River region covering about 230,000 square kilometers around 55° north latitude and 119° west longitude is the north western agricultural frontier of Canada. The cropping environment is typified by long photoperiods during short growing season and predominance of acidic luvisolic soils with poorly developed profile. This region has evolved to be one of the major pockets of seed production of forages and turf-grasses which are exported to 34 countries with major proportion destined to the USA, China, Netherlands, Germany, Poland, Denmark and Argentina. Creeping red fescue seed constitutes major bulk of export with primary use as turf-grass for lawns and gulf courses in the temperate regions. Despite being one of the pioneer crops in the region, relatively few publications exist about yield constraints analysis and optimal crop management practices. The knowledge and technology gaps are manifested by the stagnation in seed yield of the crop. This presentation synthesizes the results of studies on creeping red fescue in the Peace River region. Relevant information will also be excerpted from studies about the temperate forage seed crops to identify potential agronomic options and knowledge gaps for enhancing the seed yield of creeping red fescue.
Keynote Forum
Jose J Pueyo
Institute of Agricultural Sciences - CSIC, Spain
Keynote: Strategies to improve tolerance to abiotic stress in legumes
Time : 00:00
Biography:
Jose J Pueyo is a Full Professor and Research Group Leader at the Institute of Agricultural Sciences, Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) in Madrid, Spain. His scientific interests include the biotechnological improvement of legume crops and the study of beneficial plant-microbe interactions under environmental constraints. After obtaining his PhD, he worked as a Research Assistant at University College Dublin, Republic of Ireland, as a Fulbright Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of California, San Diego, and at The Scripps Research Institute, La Jolla, USA as a Research Associate. He then joined the Centre for Environmental Sciences, CSIC, where he was later appointed Director. He has been a Member of CSIC Committee on Agricultural Sciences, Vice-Chair of CYTED (Latin-American Programme on Cooperation in Science and Technology) Committee on Sustainable Development and Chair of COST (European Cooperation in Science and Technology) Committee on Food and Agriculture. He also works as a Scientific Advisor for the State Research Agency, where he manages several agri-food ERA-Nets.
Abstract:
Legumes play a key role in sustainable agriculture. Mineral nitrogen deficiency is an important limiting factor for plant growth in arid and semi-arid regions, and rhizobia-legume symbioses are the primary source of fixed nitrogen in such areas. The introduction of legumes and their nodulating rhizobia may have an important effect on the reclamation of degraded, polluted, saline, marginal soils for sustainable agriculture. Such recovery is becoming an urgent matter due to climate change, the increasing extension of salinized land and the ever-rising requirements for food and feed. In general, both rhizobia and legumes have a low or moderate tolerance to abiotic stress. Moreover, symbiosis and nodule functions are very sensitive to abiotic stress, more so than the host legume or the rhizobia. Thus, it is of interest to obtain bacterial inocula and legume varieties with enhanced tolerance to abiotic stress for use in soil reclamation, which can be achieved by traditional trait selection or by biotechnological procedures. We will present our results on the selection of tolerant legume cultivars and rhizobial strains, as well as our biotechnological approaches to obtain legumes and rhizobia with improved tolerance to abiotic stress. Omics analyses and genome-wide association studies (GWAS) appear as optimal tools for elucidating the physiological and molecular mechanisms that determine sensitivity or tolerance to abiotic stress in the symbiotic system, which might help define strategies to obtain nodulated legumes with enhanced tolerance to environmental stresses that act efficiently in reclaiming and exploiting marginal soils.
Keynote Forum
Daran Rudnick
University of Nebraska Lincoln, USA
Keynote: Quantifying and correcting for clay content effects on soil water measurement by reflectometers
Time : 00:00
Biography:
Daran Rudnick obtained his BS, MS and PhD Degrees from the University of Nebraska Lincoln, USA. He is currently an Assistant Professor and Irrigation Management Specialist in the Department of Biological Systems Engineering at the same university. His research focuses on improving irrigation management strategies for commonly grown crops and rotations found in the semi-arid climate of west central Nebraska. His research projects include the evaluation of deficit irrigation strategies for maize and soybean under center pivot and subsurface drip irrigation systems, integration of variable rate irrigation and nitrogen fertilizer management, assessment of residue removal effects on maize yield and crop water use and field and laboratory evaluation of soil water monitoring equipment.
Abstract:
Clay content could affect the calibration of electromagnetic soil water sensors including reflectometers. To investigate this effect further, three TDR315 and three CS655 reflectometers were installed in each of five soils with clay content ranging from 5 to 49%. As the soils were dried in a temperature-controlled room, sensor reported soil volumetric water content (θv) according to factory calibration was compared against reference θv determined by weighing the soils. Sensor-reported θv was similar to reference θv in the sand (root mean square difference (RMSD) <0.02 m3 m-3), but the discrepancy was larger for the clayey soils. An increase in clay content tended to cause TDR315 to underestimate low θv and tended to cause CS655 to overestimate θv curvilinearly. At the levels evaluated in this experiment, differences in clay content produced a larger effect than temperature (24 versus 35°C) and salinity (0 versus 3.09 g/L CaCl2) on the accuracy of the factory calibration for both sensors. Soil-specific empirical calibrations developed using quadratic regression fitted the experimental data very closely (R2>0.93) for both sensors. By estimating calibration coefficients based on clay content alone and then adjusting sensor-reported θv accordingly, RMSD from reference θv was approximately halved for both sensors. Applying the same procedure to independent literature data resulted in improvements in a soil with 39% clay content but deterioration in a soil with 17-18% clay content. A clay content correction can enhance the accuracy of some reflectometers and electromagnetic sensors for soil water measurement.