UNIVERSITÄT HOHENHEIM

Transcription

1 UNIVERSITÄT HOHENHEIM DER REKTOR 16. Oktober 2009 Grußwort anlässlich des Kolloquiums zum Welternährungstag am 16. Oktober 2009 um 10 Uhr c.t. im Bio B1 Distinguished guests, It is a pleasure for me to welcome you at our university on the World Food Day. We are very happy and proud to host such an outstanding conference on food security and to have so many distinguished guests here in Hohenheim. First of all I would like to thank the Heidelberger Akademie der Wissenschaften (Heidelberg Academy of Sciences and Humanities) represented Professor Silke Leopold today. She is Secretary of the Philosophical-Historical Section. The Adacemy s President, Professor Hahn, had a little accident yesterday and is not able to come to Hohenheim. Dear Professor Leopold, a warm welcome to Hohenheim and please give our best wishes to Professor Hahn. Analogous to the other eight universities in Baden-Württemberg we are happy to celebrate the 100 th anniversary of the Academy by hosting an academic event. It is a pleasure for our university to be invited and we are very thankful for President Hahn s personal dedication, who initiated this programme more than one and a half years ago during a visit in Hohenheim. I had the pleasure to take part in celebrating the Academy s centenary with many excellent guests in Heidelberg in July. This was a prominent event and the invited speakers payed tribute to the attainments of the Academy. As the chairman of the

2 Rectors Conference in Baden-Württemberg I could appreciate the merits of the Academy from the universities point of view during the ceremony. On behalf of our university I congratulate again today and we are looking forward to your speech, dear Professor Leopold. Amongst the other universities contribution the Universität Hohenheim has decided to arrange a conference on a topic very relevant to us: Food Security. Today s World Food Day is a very suitable day to hold this conference. Food Security is dealt with in our three faculties and in our scientific centres. Moreover we are establishing a competence centre called Food Security Centre right now. This competence centre is one of five projects at German universities funded in the programme Higher Education Excellence in Development Co-operation, which is a joint initiative of the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) and the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). Our competence centre with its partners in developing countries will receive up to 5 million EUR for promoting development cooperation over the next five years. It is one of the five winners in a competition involving 44 outstanding university projects. Since the foundation of our university food security has always been a prominent subject to us. Our institution commits itself to combat hunger and poverty. At the time of our foundation this obligation was oriented more to this region today we work on global hunger issues. The challenges ahead of us are similar to those that led to the foundation of our university. The climate changes caused by the eruption of volcano Tambora in Indonesia in 1815 resulted in crop failures and famine in Germany and other parts of Europe. To mitigate the famine in the subsequent years, King Wilhelm I of Württemberg and Queen Katharina founded an agricultural college here at Hohenheim in Even today we accept our responsibility for food security. In Hohenheim we do research into and teaching on global hunger issues, which are closely related to questions of peace and social stability in the world. More than a billion humans are starving and the children suffer most. This week the Food and Agriculture 2

3 Organization (FAO) of the United Nations has presented alarming facts and figures. Our concerns for food security must not fall short of the global initiatives to fight the financial crisis. The world has to face this huge problem and its complex circumstances. If we do nothing, the situation will surely become worse: The world s population is increasing, the area under cultivation is decreasing because of degradation and rival usage by settlements, streets, factories and industries or many other things. And we face a global financial crisis. Natural resources are produced on the area under cultivation as well. In many cases selling natural resources to produce bio-energy is more profitable than producing food. Unfair pricing is quite common and bio-energy users pay often more than hungry people can afford. The challenges, which future agriculture on our planet may face due to the expected climate change, may be even more critical. Increased greenhouse gases and temperature, and erratic rainfall are going to further accentuate our current problems. Thus, ensuring food security and at the same time conserving natural resources of the planet may face many new challenges. Together with the concerns on climate change, they have become important topics on the agenda of high-ranking political meetings, such as the recently held G20 summit in Pittsburgh or the G8 summit in Italy. To discuss this complex topic we have invited excellent experts and we are extraordinarily glad that they have accepted our invitation. There are many different points of view on our topic and our guests may represent these diverse attitudes. Every speaker has a special competence. And together we can hopefully work on a positive solution for the world food situation: I would like to welcome Professor Patrick Webb, the former Chief of Nutrition for the UN World Food Programme (to August 2005). Today he is Dean for Academic Affairs and Professor at the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy at Tufts University in Boston and he is an expert on topics of food security. It would take too long to list all the corresponding activities. I just want to highlight a few aspects: 3

4 Professor Webb spent six years living in Africa (Ethiopia, Niger, The Gambia), and many more years working in remote parts of Asia and Latin America on program implementation and evaluation. He serves on expert panels for UNICEF and WHO and advised the Gates Foundation on agricultural policy and global nutrition strategy. Currently he is principal investigator for USAID s global food aid quality review. And from 1996 to 1998 he was Professor in Hohenheim (endowed professorship). It is a pleasure to see you again, dear Patrick Webb. We are looking forward to listening to your speech. Professor Ernst Ulrich von Weizsäcker will hold a speech today as well, but arrives a few minutes later. Today the Resource Panel of the United Nations Environment Programme, Professor von Weizsäcker co-chairs, presents its first report in Nairobi. Right now, Professor von Weizsäcker speaks to the audience in Nairobi by videoconference. We are very happy, that he decided to come to Hohenheim instead of attending the conference in Nairobi. This first report of the Resource panel deals with biofuels and therefore we have a very interesting connection to our topic. Professor von Weizsäcker may give us the latest findings on biofuels and the antagonism between food and resource production and possible harmonisations. Both, Professor Webb and Professor von Weizsäcker, will attend the panel discussion. This discussion will as well be enriched by further dialogue partners, I would like to introduce briefly to you: Right now I would have liked to welcome Professor Hahlbrock. Unfortunately Professor Hahlbrock had to cancel his acceptance this Monday because of personal matters. He is very sorry, that he is not able to attend the colloquium. Our colleague Professor Albrecht Melchinger is going to take this part over. Thank you, dear Professor Melchinger, for your help and your contribution. In Hohenheim Professor Melchinger is Professor for plant breeding and an expert in genetic engineering. Therefore he has the right background to stand in for Professor Hahlbrock. 4

5 Ms. Ingar Brueggemann represents the German Foundation for World Population (Deutsche Stiftung Weltbevölkerung) as Vice-Chairman of the Foundation s Board today. Ms. Brueggemann helped out at short notice, because Ms. Renate Bähr had to cancel our colloquium this Tuesday. The foundation s main goal is to help people free themselves from poverty and to protect themselves from unwanted pregnancies and HIV/AIDS. For this purpose the foundation supports family planning and sexual and reproductive health projects in Africa and Asia. Ms. Brueggemann herself can look back on a long professional career at the World Health Organization (WHO). For several years she was Director of External Coordination for Health and Social Development. From 1992 she was in charge of the Development Policy Forum of the German Foundation for International Development in Berlin, and from 1995 to 2002 she was the Director-General of the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF), London. Dear Ms. Brueggemann, it is a pleasure to have you here. Moreover I would like to welcome Mr. Michael Windfuhr, Head of Division for Human Rights at the Foundation Bread for the World (Brot für die Welt). Bread for the World is a programme set up by the protestant churches in Germany in Bread for the World works jointly with local churches and partner organisations in Africa, Asia, Latin America and Eastern Europe on over 1,000 projects, all of which are aimed at helping people to help themselves. The word Bread does not only refer to food. Bread for the World fights to give people everything they need to live their lives in dignity independent of origin and social status. Last, not least I want to welcome the sixth member of the panel discussion: Professor Manfred Zeller. Here in Hohenheim he is responsible for Rural Development Theory and Policy. In the their research domains Professor Zeller and his team focus for example on food and social security, poverty and gender, rural development and migration, microfinance, agricultural research and technology adaption, global environmental change and renewable energy. Together with Professor Cadisch Professor Zeller was also responsible for the proposal for the newly established Food Security Centre I have already mentioned. 5

6 Today s moderator is Dr. Martin Kilgus. He is Vice Head of SWR International, the department for migration and integration of our regional broadcasting station. As a media expert he will moderate the discussion skilfully. Dear Dr. Kilgus, we are very happy to have you here. Our federal state government is represented by Friedlinde Gurr-Hirsch, State Secretary in the Ministry of Food and Rural Area. She will close the panel discussion and our colloquium at 2:30 p.m. with some prospects. Furthermore we are very happy to host the award ceremony for the Justus von Liebig-Award today the award is donated by the Eiselen-Foundation this year for the first time. The purpose of this award is closely related to the topic of the World Food Day and our colloquium. The Eiselen-Foundation and especially Dr. Hermann Eiselen, the university s senator of honour, have supported and funded many important projects at our university during the last decades and they were always concerned about food security. Fighting against hunger in the world was one of Dr. Eiselen s guiding principles and is to be continued by the Eiselen-Foundation and our university. On June 21 this year our Senator of Honour Dr. Eiselen has passed away after a short period of illness. Our university mourns Dr. Eiselen and Professor Heidhues will commemorate him today. The Eiselen-Foundation supports this colloquium, too. Only the generosity of our Senators of Honour Karl Strenger and Günter Daiss as well as the Eiselen-Stiftung has made this colloquium possible. They deserve our gratitude and they commit themselves to the purpose of food security this way. I would like to welcome you and thank you very much. Dear Mr. Strenger, it is a pleasure to see you here and please accept my sincere thanks for your support. Dear Mr. Daiss, welcome to this special event you have sponsored. Thank you very much. 6

7 Dear Dr. Fadani, we are very pleased to welcome you as the representative of the Eiselen-Foundation and we are very grateful for your support. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for your attention. 7