A new edition of the Agrobiodiversity Summer School began at CISPAC on Thursday, 3 September. Over the course of ten days, students will take part in training sessions, present the case studies they have developed over recent months and carry out fieldwork at various locations across Galicia.
The initiative is organised by CISPAC in collaboration with the Geography of Food research group at the Zurich University of Applied Sciences (ZHAW) and the Research Institute of Organic Agriculture (FiBL), with funding from Stiftung Mercator Schweiz. This is the first time that this international programme has returned to a previous host location, following the edition also held in Galicia in 2022.
Lourenzo Fernández Prieto, David Soto Fernández and Stefania Barca, members of the USC Histagra research group and CISPAC, as well as Jaime Fagúndez, a member of the TIT-UN research group and CISPAC, are part of the organising and teaching team alongside researchers from ZHAW, FiBL and Pablo de Olavide University.
The course brings together nearly 30 participants from eight countries with backgrounds in fields such as environmental sciences, the humanities, agronomy, food systems, rural studies and sustainability. Through an applied and collaborative methodology, the school seeks to encourage international exchange and critical thinking about the social and environmental challenges facing landscapes, territories, and systems of production and consumption.
Featuring a wide range of activities and field trips, the programme combines classroom and group-work sessions with visits to a variety of initiatives in Galicia: the Entrelampo market garden and social inclusion project in Santiago de Compostela; the multifunctional model developed by Granxas de Lousada in Irixoa; the family-run winery Terra de Asorei in Meis; the Muros on-foot shellfish-gathering association; the Baroña common land community in Porto do Son; and the Casa Bértolo dairy farm in Friol.
The programme will therefore focus on analysing different approaches to resource and production management, ranging from small family farms and cooperative projects to community-owned common lands. The diversity of Galicia’s agroecosystems, the historical knowledge associated with them and the challenges threatening their conservation make Galicia a particularly suitable setting in which to study agrobiodiversity and explore new pathways towards more sustainable food systems.