ProPopulus Team
On October 21st and 22nd, the International Conference ‘Populus 360. Innovation, collaboration and challenges in the poplar sector’, will take place in Ponferrada Spain, with ProPopulus Chairman, Professor Joris Van Acker, as main speaker. The event is organized by the School of Agricultural and Forestry Engineering (EIAF) of the Universidad de León in partnership with the populiculture company and ProPopulus sponsor Bosques y Ríos.
According to the event’s promoters “Populus 360 is an event about innovation, collaboration and challenges in the poplar sector, organized to establish bridges between public and private institutions, researchers, companies, forest owners, poplar growers, students and anyone interested.”
More than 25 speakers (see the programme here) from leading research and innovation institutes in Belgium, Italy, Argentina, or Chile will be present at the conference. The event will be held both online and onsite.
The speakers come from countries that have found formulas to address the management of this species in a sustainable way, with varieties resistant to disease and totally complementary to agricultural exploitation, explained Joaquin Garnica, general director of Bosques y Ríos.
“Due to the economic, environmental and social importance of poplar it is necessary to organize conferences like these. By bringing the different agents involved together to face the challenges and build opportunities for collaboration that would lead to the strengthening of the industry, we try to be a lever for change”, said Flor Álvarez Taboada, deputy director of the School of Agricultural and Forestry Engineering (EIAF) of the Ponferrada Campus.
Joaquin Garnica stated, “Bosques y Ríos is a company devoted to growing poplars, but we have a strong investigative philosophy. We believe that the way to improve populiculture is through innovation. This is the reason why we started this collaboration with the Universidad de León. The idea of holding an event to bring people from all over the world to teach in Spain what was being done in the poplar sector worldwide is the result of this collaboration”.