SPS Summer School 2023: “Seeds as a keystone for the transition to agroecology”

Saclay Plant Sciences (SPS), Versailles, France

Seed quality is of paramount importance for agricultural performance and resistance to environmental constraints. Ensuring the health and high physiological potential of seeds is crucial for agri-food system sustainability and for international trade markets.

This Summer School will focus on the challenges of ensuring seed protection while meeting demands for a more environmentally respectful agriculture, reducing risks for humans and maintaining ecosystem health. Sessions will address the genetic and physiological traits required to deal with fluctuating abiotic conditions and ecological communities of commensal and pathogenic microorganisms. Innovative strategies being developed to improve seed quality through plant breeding and post-harvest technologies will be presented and economic and social factors as well as the legal framework for implementation will be considered.

It is an intensive one-week programme, involving theoretical lectures by renowned experts and hands on practical courses on state-of-the-art technologies and approaches. It will bring together outstanding and enthusiastic young scientists (Master2 students, PhD students, young post-docs) and high-level researchers, as well as industrial representatives, in order to exchange knowledge and ideas in a field at the forefront of plant biology research. Further details about the course are available here.

This Summer School will be jointly organized with the SUCSEED project consortium (Stop the Use of pestiCides on Seeds by proposing alternatives; PPR-CPA 2021-2027).