The Second Conference of the Spanish Legumes Association (AEL), entitled ‘New challenges and opportunities for legumes in the Spanish food and feed sectors’, was held in Cuenca on 25–27 April, 2006. The conference attracted fifty-one papers with the most recent Spanish results on agronomy, biotic and abiotic stresses, genetic resources, breeding, production, commercial strategies, technological application and new uses of legumes species in Spain.
The opening lecture ‘Legumes: potential sources of bioactive components’ was presented by Dr Francisco Millán, Director of the Instituto de la Grasa (Fats Institute) of Seville. Sixteen papers were selected for oral presentation in four round-table sessions. Thirty communications were presented as posters. The subjects of the round tables and main lectures were:
Round table 1: Legumes production in Spain. ‘The role of legumes crops in the Mediterranean sustainable agriculture: reality or illusion’, lecture by Dr Luis López Bellido, Professor at Córdoba University.
Round table 2: Genetic resources and breeding of legume crops in Spain. ‘Rules for the control, certification and trade of legume seeds’, lecture by Dr Daniel Palmero, Technical Department of Varieties Evaluation (INIA).
Round table 3: Legume research in a European framework, biotechnological aspects. ‘Research on grain legumes in the European Union’, lecture by Dr Álvaro Ramos, President of AEP.
Round table 4: Technological applications and commercial strategies for the legume sector. ‘Science, innovation and technological development’, lecture by Dr Alfredo Tiemblo, Vice-president of the Confederation of Spanish Scientific Societies (COSCE).
All the participants were very active in the round-table discussions and in the poster session, thus meeting the main objective of AEL conferences: to be a forum for discussion between the different groups associated with legumes: researchers, farmers, enterprises and administration.
The local government of Castilla La Mancha and the Mayor of Cuenca afforded the event a very warm reception and closing ceremony. A great effort was made to obtain good local dissemination, and the event was presented on many TV channels, in newspapers and in agricultural magazines. The organisation and subject of the GLIP project were also disseminated through a poster in Spanish elaborated by members of Workpackage 8.1 (Dissemination of knowledge) and some of their results were presented by Spanish members of this consortium.
Another of the activities of this Conference was the AEL General Assembly where the Executive Committee was re-elected. The composition of this Committee is:
President: Antonio de Ron (CSIC)
Vice-president: Mercedes Muzquiz (INIA)
Secretary: Paula Rodiño (CSIC)
Past- president: Celia de la Cuadra (INIA)
Members: Marcelino de los Mozos (CIA Albaladejito); Antonio Ortiz (GRUCOL, S.A.); Constantino Caminero (ITACYL) and Vidal Mate (Bean D.O. label Lourenzá).
Source: Celia de la Cuadra and Lucía de la Rosa, INIA, Spain. (rosa@inia.es)
