Two outstanding master theses on the theme of food security were centre stage at the Tropentag 2019 opening ceremony.



Hundreds of people at the #Tropentag2019 stood still to reward academic hard-work, dedication and innovation, as the 21st edition of the Hans H. Ruthenberg - Graduate Award was given out. This prestigious award, instituted in honour of the famous German Agriculturist- Prof. Dr. Hans-Hartwig Ruthenberg, has been awarded to 54 recipients since 1999 for outstanding scholarly work on food security.

You may have heard about rainmakers before, the ones whose influence can bring progress or success. Well, this story is about a forest maker: Tony Rinaudo. Like rainmakers, Tony has a magic touch, in his case to spread native trees in dry lands and bringing countless benefits to the local population. His work on Niger was so impressive that he was awarded the Alternative Nobel Prize in 2018.

30 youths from over 15 countries gathered to proffer youthful solutions to global agriculture challenges at the Tropentag 2019.


The 21st edition of the largest gathering on tropical and subtropical agriculture, Tropentag, kick-started today with a pre-conference workshop titled “Supporting youth in agriculture and research: Role of youth-based organisations”. This session was facilitated by two #YouthinAg centred organisation; YPARD and Agrinatura. With global youth membership over 16,000 and support from FAO and Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, YPARD has been providing #YouthinAg support and mentorship for the past 11 years. The Agrinatura also plays the same role with the support received from major European research and education stakeholders. If you would agree with me, the session was facilitated by competent hands.

Nutrition Sensitive Value Chain (NSVC) is not just a value chain. It uses a set of multidisciplinary tools and methods, research and development that aim at improving the nutritional status of the target population as well as incomes and livelihoods of actors along the chain. It also consists of products, processes, people and policies that support nutrition in the food value chain.


By adopting the NSVC framework, a project is able to improve diets of vulnerable rural and urban consumers through increased consumption of more diverse, safe and nutrient-dense foods, which are sourced directly from smallholder farmers. Therefore, NSVCs touch everyone in the chain from farmers, wholesalers, processors, consumers and state actors (policies, standards and safety authorities, NGOs etc.).

What do a mining company in Peru, a forest in Ecuador and a river in India have in common? All of them have been stages for conflicts caused by unsustainable practices. The impact caused by those practices in nature affects the ones who most need it: the people who historically live there.

On an attempt to understand this global and complex topic, scientists from different areas got together in Kassel yesterday afternoon, kicking off the Conference Tropentag 2019. Organized by the Center for Development Research (ZEF) at University of Bonn, the workshop called attention to a potential (and surprising) solution: ask the locals! Listening and integrating their knowledge allows easier understanding of where the conflict is happening, its intensity and action taken when they scale up.

Guten Tag!

It is the day before the main activities of Tropentag 2019 kick off in Kassel, Germany and preparations by the student reporter team are in full swing.

Tropentag 2019 is full of promise, there are 24 sessions of oral presentations, with 107 individual presentations, as well as 29 guided poster sessions, with 310 individual poster presentations. Tropentag 2019 is attended by almost 900 people, hailing from a staggering 85 countries. Importantly, in this year's Tropentag conference bag, there is a reuseable cup for beverage consumption, and almost 1/3 of attendees chose not to recieve the printed book of abstracts, saving 250 printed copies. #GoGreta !  

As the conference unfolds, you'll see us Student Reporters in our white t-shirts (we'll be taking great care not to spill on them) running around like busy little bees. Please feel free to approach us if you'd like your poster, presentation or general self documented here within our blog or on Twitter, Flickr, YouTube, Instagram, or Facebook.  

You can follow us at #Tropentag2019, and we wish you all great success and much fun over the coming days. 

Ana comes from one of the biggest cities of South America: Rio, in Brazil. She is a bachelor student of Sustainable Agriculture at Hochschule Rhein-Waal. After studying Agricultural Engineering in Brazil, she felt the need to look deeper into the topic of sustainability in the food production chain, because she is eager to dive into the world of natural sciences and the socio-economic aspects surrounding them. As a student reporter, Ana is part of our blog team - she is responsible for capturing on camera the moments that will be written about in our blog.

Regarding her expectations during the event, Ana states that her major interest is to discover and engage with new projects happening worldwide and to get an inspirational overview of what is happening at the moment in her field of studies. She likes to learn and discuss topics such as sustainability, ecofeminism and climate-driven policy-making.

She has the camera as her main accessory this week and is looking forward to vehiculate to the world the amazing moments we will have at the Conference.

Rasha studied her Master's of environmental protection at the University of Hohenheim. She is interested in scientific journalism in order to create a positive impact on the world. According to Rasha, our Bangladeshi native student reporter, journalism can create a bridge between the scientific community and policymakers, and it could be the best way to bring the research in easy and simple way to public.

Considering the theme of Tropentag, Rasha believes such a conference could be a great place for communication and networking with the policymakers, politicians and research communities. To create changes, it is important to generate awareness and speak about how to act from the findings from the research for sustainable resource management.

How great it would be to have specialized journalism reports rather than only general talk on climate change?

Research is the solution to, and the result of, many problems. The findings from the research need to be communicated outside of the scientific community to the policymakers, stakeholders and to the public to know how to fight with the climate change and to ensure the food security of the world.