Keynote Speakers
Dr Shoki Al-Dobai, PhDIntegration & Support Team Leader
International Plant Protection Convention Secretariat
Food & Agriculture Organization of the United NationsDr Shoki Al-Dobai holds a PhD degree in Plant Protection – Entomology from the Slovak University of Agriculture in Slovakia with over 18 years’ work experience at national, regional and international levels in pest management, biological control, pesticide management and phytosanitary measures. Currently, he works as the Integration & Support Team Leader of the Secretariat of the International Plant Protection Convention (IPPC) at Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations (UN). His is in charge of support and coordination of the work of the IPPC governing body “Commission on Phytosanitary Measures (CPM)”, strategic planning, partnership, and communication and advocacy activities of the IPPC Secretariat. In addition to the technical activities related to the emerging pests and plant health issues.
From 2011 to 2017 he served as a Regional Crop Protection Officer at the FAO Regional Office for the Near East & North Africa Region in Cairo, Egypt. He provided guidance and technical support to governmental institutions in the formulation and implementation of FAO plant protection projects and programmes, both at the national and regional levels. In addition to the FAO work history, Dr. Al-Dobai has also academic and research experience as Lecturer and Assistant Professor at different universities, and as visiting Post-Doctoral Research Entomologist at the Center for Medical, Agricultural and Veterinary Entomology (CMAVE), Agricultural Research Service (ARS), US Department of Agriculture, Gainesville, Florida, USA. He worked on a research project and examined environmentally friendly methods to conserve and increase population of natural enemies of plant pests by planting specific flowering plants amidst and near crops.
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Dr Geoff NortonAdjunct Professor, University of Queensland, Brisbane, AustraliaDr Geoff Norton is currently Adjunct Professor at The University of Queensland (UQ), Brisbane as well as an advisor to the software development company – Identic Pty. Ltd., a spin-off company involving staff initially based at UQ. Previously Geoff was Director of the Centre for Pest Management, Imperial College, University of London (1984 – 1992); Director of the Cooperative Research Centre for Tropical Pest Management, CSIRO, Australia (1992 – 98); and Director of the Centre for Biological Information Technology at UQ (1998 – 2012). The overall theme of Geoff’s research over almost 50 years has been at the interface of socio-economics and ecology. This has led to the development and worldwide application of systems analysis, stakeholder involvement processes, and the development of decision support tools that address specific resource management problems, with a particular focus on decisions involving crop protection issues. He has published over 100 journal articles, books and book chapters in this field.
More recently, Geoff works with the software team at Identic Pty Ltd, the group that developed the Lucid suite of software, used by taxonomists, agronomists and other specialists to author multi-media, interactive identification and diagnostic keys or tools. These tools are deployed via USB, CD/DVDs, online, and as Lucid Mobile smartphone apps to support decisions made by researchers, quarantine officers, crop advisors, farmers, etc.
Geoff is currently President of the International Association for the Plant Protection Sciences (IAPPS).
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Dr. Opender Koul Fiae, FNAASDirector
Insect Biopesticide Research CentreDr Opender Koul, Fellow of the National Academy of Agricultural Sciences and the Indian Academy of Entomology, is an insect toxicologist/physiologist/chemical ecologist and currently the Director of the Insect Biopesticide Research Centre, Jalandhar, India, and Adjunct Professor, Faculty of Science, Kasetsart University, Bangkok. After obtaining his PhD in 1975, he joined the Regional Research Laboratory (CSIR), Jammu, and then became Senior Group Leader of Entomology at Malti-Chem Research Centre, Vadodara, India (1980–1988). He has been a visiting scientist at the University of Kanazawa, Japan (1985–1986), University of British Columbia, Canada (1988–1992), Institute of Plant Protection, Poznan, Poland (2001), and Kasetsart University, Bangkok (2009). His extensive research experience concerns insect—plant interactions, spanning toxicological, physiological, and agricultural aspects. Dr Koul has been honoured with an Indian National Science Academy medal (INSA), the Kothari Scientific Research Institute award, KEC Science Society award, Recognition Award of the National Academy of Agricultural Sciences of India for outstanding contribution in the field of insect toxicology/ physiology and plant protection, Dr. R.C. Saxena Memorial Medal of Entomological Research Association, and the late P.P. Singhal Memorial Award in Entomology. Dr Koul is on panels of experts in many committees and leading international and national journals. He is the Editor-in-Chief of the journal Biopesticides International and Industrial Crops and Products. He has also been an informal consultant to the Board on Science and Technology in International Development (BOSTID), and to the National Research Council (NRC) of the United States at the International Centre for Insect Physiology and Ecology (ICIPE), Nairobi; UNIDO consultant for biopesticides in China; and ICS-UNIDO consultant in Nigeria. He has authored over 240 research papers and articles, and is the author/editor of 20 books on various aspects of biopesticides.
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Prof. Dr. Frank OrdonHead of Institute
Julius Kühn-Institute (JKI)Prof. Dr. Frank Ordon is president of the JKI and honorary professor for “Molecular resistance breeding” at the Martin-Luther-University, Halle-Wittenberg, Germany. He studied agricultural science at the Justus Liebig University in Giessen, Germany, where he also got his PhD and state doctorate (Dr. habil.). He is the editor in chief of “Plant Breeding” and is a member of several editorial boards, e.g. “Theoretical and Applied Genetics”, “Journal of Applied Genetics,” and scientific advisory boards. He is chair of the Research Committee of the Wheat Initiative.
Frank has a basic background in classical and molecular plant breeding with special emphasis on breeding for resistance against viral and fungal pathogens in barley and wheat. His primary contribution includes genetic analyses of resistance and the development of molecular markers for major resistance genes and QTL, especially against virus diseases, up to gene isolation. Besides this, he is working on improving tolerance to abiotic stress in several crop species. Frank has published the results of his studies in more than 130 papers in peer reviewed journals.
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Dr. Jörg RomeisAgroscope, Research Division Agroecology and Environment, Reckenholzstrasse 191, 8046 Zurich, SwitzerlandDr. Jörg Romeis heads the Biosafety Research Group at Agroscope in Zurich, Switzerland. Agroscope is the Swiss center of excellence for agricultural research, and is affiliated with the Federal Office for Agriculture. In addition, he is lecturer at the University of Bern and adjunct professor at the Institute of Plant Protection of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences in Beijing.
Jörg holds an MSc and PhD in biology and was trained as an applied entomologist with a focus on biological pest control and multi-trophic interactions. He has more than 20 years of experience in studying insect-resistant genetically engineered (GE) plants, such as Bt maize and cotton, and with the environmental risk assessment that these plants have to pass prior to cultivation. His research is focusing on the effects of GE plants on arthropod herbivores and their predators and parasitoids. In addition to primary research, Jörg is actively involved in international expert groups defining operational environmental protection goals, and in developing guidelines for risk assessment and non-target testing to ensure that GE plants released to the environment do not cause environmental harm.
In total, Jörg has published more than 170 papers in peer-review journals. He has also edited a book that addressed the integration of insect-resistant GM plants in IPM programs.
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