中国植物病理学会

The 10^th International Congress of Plant Pathology (ICPP2013) was held from the 25^th to the 30^th of August 2013 at Beijing International Convention Center (BICC), which is near the beautiful Olympic Village. This Congress also incorporated the 2013 Annual Meeting of the Chinese Society for Plant Pathology (CSPP).

The event attracted 1779 delegates representing 72 countries from around the world, plus more than 100 accompanying persons and 160 volunteers (Fig. 1 indicates the geographic distribution of delegates. The top 15 countries with the most delegates are shown in Fig. 2). There were 2 plenary sessions, 5 keynote sessions, 66 concurrent sessions and 9 evening sessions. A total of 1591 abstracts was received, including 329 invited lectures for plenary, keynote and concurrent sessions. From the 1262 papers offered, 196 were selected as short talks at concurrent sessions.

The congress was held under the high patronage of the China Association of Science & Technology, the National Natural Science Foundation of China and China Agricultural University.

Opening Ceremony

The Congress began with a Chinese style drum dancing as the opening performance, which expressed our wish to evict evil spirits and bring good luck and peace to the world. The intense, energetic and rhythmic beats accompanied by the colorful dancing of the drummers made a strong visual and auditory impact on the audience. After the performance, the delegates were sequentially welcomed by Maria Lodovica Gullino, President of the International Society of Plant Pathology, Zhangliang Chen, vice President of China Association of Science & Technology, Bingsheng Ke, President of China Agricultural University, Rongxiang Fang, vice President of ICPP 2013 and You-Liang Peng, Chairperson of ICPP2013.

Scientific Programme

It is expected that the world’s population will reach 9 billion by 2050. To match this overwhelming demand for the supply of food, plant pathologists have been seeking new ways for the efficient and sustainable production of food and fibre. To emphasize plant pathologists’ efforts, the main theme for the 10th ICPP was designated as “Bio-security, Food Safety and Plant Pathology: The Role of Plant Pathology in a Globalized Economy”.

Fig.1 Geographic distribution of ICPP2013 delegates

Fig.2 The top 15 countries with the most delegates

In recognition of the importance of this topic, the Organizing Committee allocated the lecture entitled “Crop Genomics and Biotechnology: Feeding the Billions” to the opening session. two plenary sessions titled “The Role of Plant Pathology in a Globalized Economy” and “Can We Improve Global Food Security?”, respectively, one keynote session titled “The Role of Plant Pathology in Bio-security and Food Safety”, and a special evening session titled “1 Billion Hungry People: What Can We Do?”

The opening lecture was addressed by Prof. Qifa Zhang from Huazhong Agricultural University, China, who is an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, a fellow of the Third World Academy of Sciences and a foreign associate of the National Academy of Sciences, USA. For the special evening session, the World Food Prize Laureate of 2009, Prof. Gebisa Ejeta from Purdue University, USA, delivered the Glen Anderson Lecture titled “One Billion Hungry People: What Can We Do?”.

The congress scientific program was dense and rich, with topics covering diverse aspects of modern Plant Pathology (Table 1). In addition to the above mentioned two plenary sessions and one keynote session, there were four more keynote sessions. Notably, lectures on molecular plant microbe interactions and omics were integrated into these sessions and were highly appraised by the audiences.

There were 66 concurrent sessions in which 45 topics were involved. In most cases, for each of the sessions, there were four invited talks and four short talks. There were in total about 500 oral presentations. Highlights for the concurrent sessions included topics on research progress in emerging directions and frontier areas of Plant Pathology, such as “Nanotechnology for Plant Health”, “Forensic Plant Pathology”, “Molecular Host-Pathogen Interactions” and “Genomics and Proteomics”. Also included were the new technologies and strategies for rapid detection of pathogens, accurate monitoring, diagnosis and management of plant diseases and novel models for carrying out the extension mission.

More than 1100 posters were displayed during the Congress. Poster-viewing was vibrant, well attended and informative, covering topics ranging from disease management in the field to the molecular analysis of plant pathogens in the lab.

All topics covered by the congress were of crucial importance to our Bio-security and Food Safety, as well as to the sustainability of our agricultural systems and natural landscapes. For delegates’ convenience, abstracts of the invited and offered papers were published as a special issue of 620 pages of the CSPP Journal, "Acta Phytopathologica Sinica", available also on CD-ROM.

Workshops

There were 9 satellite workshops prior to or post the Congress. Six of them were held in Beijing. The first one was “the 4th Workshop of the International Cereal Nematodes Initiative” organized by the Institute of Plant Protection, Chinese Academy of Science and CIMMYT/Turkey, which was held at the Friendship Hotel Grand, Beijing from 22 to 24 August. Three workshops were held at the Congress venue, Beijing International Convention Centre from 24 to 25 August. These were “5th International Phytophthora, Pythium, and Related Genera Workshop”, “International Workshop on Viroids and Satellite RNAs (IWVdS)” and “Management of Plasmodiophorid Plant Pathogens to Ensure Food Security”. China Agricultural University and ISPP Epidemiology Committee organized the “11th International Epidemiology Workshop”, which was held from 22 to 25August at the Jinma Hotel, Beijing. After the Congress, a four-day workshop, “Global Root Health Forum”, sponsored by Syngenta, was also held in Beijing. Three pre-Congress workshops were held outside Beijing, the “11th International Fusarium Workshop” organized by the ISPP Fusarium Committee and Zhejiang University at Hangzhou, August 22-24, the “5th International Symposium on Rhizoctonia: Progress and Challenges in the 21st Century” organized by the ISPP Rhizoctonia Committee and Henan Agricultural University at Zhengzhou, 22-24 August, and the “15th International Sclerotinia Workshop” organized by Huazhong Agricultural University and the Oil Crops Research Institute of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences at Wuhan, 20-24 August.

Post-Congress Technical Excursion

There was “Forest Pathology Field Tour” from 31 August to 2 September, which was organized by the Department of Forest Protection, Beijing Forestry University, ISPP Forest Pathology Interest Group and the Chinese Society of Forest Pathology. During the three-day tour participants were able to see a number of tree diseases in the greater Beijing area and had the opportunity to spend time with fellow forest pathologists to discuss tree health issues.

Social Programme

Two social events were offered by the Organizing Committee to the delegates. The welcome reception in the evening of August 25 was attended by more than 1200 delegates, providing the delegates with an opportunity to meet and talk with old friends, to make new friends and to taste delicious Chinese food. The Congress dinner was attended by 856 participants in the Auditorium of BICC on the night of Thursday, August 29th. During the dinner, all the attendees enjoyed a wonderful performance, illustrating Chinese culture, by the Beijing Song and Dance Ensemble.

Closing Ceremony

The Congress concluded on the afternoon of Friday, August 30th with a closing session chaired by Prof. Maria Lodovica Gullino, President of ISPP. Several awards were presented.

The ISPP 11^th Jakob Eriksson Prize was presented to Dr. Jeffrey B. Jones by a representative of the Swedish Embassy on behalf of the ISPP and the Swedish Academy of Science. Dr. Jeffrey B. Jones is a professor at the University of Florida, and is highly recognized for his numerous seminal research contributions in plant bacteriology that have substantially increased our understanding of the interactions between bacterial pathogens and their host plants. Prof. Jones presented the Jakob Eriksson Oration on recent approaches to the control of bacterial spot of pepper and tomato and bacterial canker of citrus.

ISPP Fellowships were awarded to Prof. Richard Falloon for his contribution to plant pathology and for his service to, and continued support of, the International Society for Plant Pathology; to Prof. Jaccov Katan for his studies on the biology and epidemiology of economically important soil-borne pathogens and for his attention to integrated plant disease management, with a special mention for the development of soil solarisation as well as for his strong support of the activities of ISPP in the Middle East; to Prof. Richard Strange for his contribution to research and teaching in plant pathology, especially in relation to food security in developing countries, and for his great effort in the creation and development of the Society’s own journal, Food Security, as a channel for sharing knowledge in this uniquely challenging arena.

There followed an announcement of ISPP new officers, and the ISPP congress flag was passed from Prof. Maria Lodovica Gullino to Dr. Greg I. Johnson, the new President of ISPP. A passionate speech was then delivered by Dr. Greg I. Johnson. The closing ceremony was finalized by Prof. You-Liang Peng, the ICPP2013 Chairperson, followed by a formal invitation to ICPP2018 in Boston USA, presented by Prof. Michael J. Boehm on behalf of ICPP2018 hosting society, APS.

Bursary Scheme

Thanks to the generosity of several international, national and local institutions, 119 bursaries were offered. The countries receiving the highest number of bursaries were India, Pakistan and Egypt. The highest bursary given to an individual was 2,798 €.