Agriculture science for most people has this name of being bad, of being about pollution, about large-scale, about the destruction of the environment. That is not necessary. We need more science and not less. And we need good science. But there is something we must do. It's not enough to say "Let's get more bold science into agriculture." We ourselves must go back, and think about our own food chain. We need to think differently about our science as a whole. Every meal we eat contains ingredients from all across the world. Everything makes us so privileged, that we can eat this food, that we don't struggle every day. And that, evolutionarily-speaking, is unique. We've never had that before. This is why it's time for agricutural scientists to stand for responsible agriculture and food consumption, as they are crucial to world stability. Enjoy the talk of Louise Fresco, a powerful thinker and sustainability advisor, on feeding the whole world. She says environmentally sound mass production will feed the world, yet leaving a role for small scalers and traditional methods.

In recognition of the United Nations' declaration of 2010 as the 'International Year of Biodiversity', the Association for Tropical Biology and Conservation (ATBC) has included a special section on biodiversity in its September 2010 issue of Biotropica. The section includes 16 commentaries assembled by Jaboury Ghazoul, an ecologist at ETH Zurich and Editor-in-Chief of Biotropica. The editorials cover a wide range of issues relating to tropical biodiversity.

''This is a fantastic experiment... I am optimistic about the outcome and I am eagerly waiting to see whether it engages broader audiences'' Jack Heinemann, Professor for Genetics and Gene Ecology at the University of Canterbury, NZ, and author of the book “Hope not Hype: The Future of Agriculture”, commented about the student reporter at the Tropentag 2010. Watch his inspiring comments about this brand new innovation on reporting the scientific event.

On his reactions to the Tropentag, Jack Heinemann, Professor for Genetics and Gene Ecology at the University of Canterbury, NZ, and author of the book “Hope not Hype: The Future of Agriculture”, commented that this event gives a legacy to the milestone report “International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development” known as IAASTD. This international documents is in danger of being forgotten. When different stakeholders discuss and reflect on the report it helps to keep the message into the head, and keep pressures on the policy makers. Read summaries of the presentation and discussion on the report on our blog post, Final Address: Agriculture at the Crossroads or missing K,

All the keynotes are now accessible as video streams at the ETH Multimedia Portal. Be sure to check it out!

After three days of intense debates, the Tropentag did not arrive at a final destination but at a road sign pointing in several directions. Figuratively speaking, Jack Heinemann, Professor for Genetics and Gene Ecology at the University of Canterbury, NZ, and author of the book “Hope not Hype: The Future of Agriculture”, had pulled the road sign out of the ground and was waving it in front of the audience that had gathered for a last time in the Scherrer Auditorium of ETH Zurich. Mr. Heinemann spoke about the findings and opportunities envisioned by the IAASTD report to which he contributed as co-author. Jack Heinemann presenting the IAASTD

Blogging, tweeting, flickring, facebooking, youtubeing, photographing, videoing, interviewing… Four days, 54 blog entries, 300 pictures (approx. 3000 raw pictures equaling to 10 GB of hard-disk space), 7300 page views, 4500 unique page views, 905 absolute unique blog visitors at a bounce rate of 30%... The Student Reporters washed their post-Tropentag-2010 depression down with a few liters of beer, overlooking the Uetliberg and the city of Zurich. We would like to thank all the participants for the cheers, the smiles, the good moods and the hopeful vibes you gave to our reports. From our side, we hope that we helped you to make your meaningful work known to those that didn’t have the chance to attend this year’s conference. We worked hard during the last three days. This is what we are expecting from you too. You are the ones that have to take care of the future. And for this, we wish you, well... GOOD LUCK! We do hope that the Tropentag Student Reporter is here to stay as an institution. We are proud to be the first ones! Take good care of yourselves and see you in Tropentag 2011 in Bonn. This blog is now yours! Keep it going, keep it awake and keep it real! Prost to you all! Oral Beer Session I

Simon Cook, Challenge programme on water and food talks on how water crises affect development. He considers four major nested crises which inlcude water scarcity, vulnerability with related to hazards, lack of sharing of information, resources and distribution of benefits and water productivity . These problems can only be solved through multidisciplinary or transdisciplinar approach, and Tropentag contributes importantly to the existing knowledge of water and development. Watch and listen to his conclusive comments