Preface

The annual Tropentag, the largest European interdisciplinary conference on research in Tropical and Subtropical Agriculture and Natural Resource Management, rotates between the universities of Berlin, Bonn, Göttingen, Hohenheim, Kassel-Witzenhausen, Prague, Vienna and ZALF e.V. Müncheberg.


On-going organisational support for the event is provided by the Council for Tropical and Subtropical Research (ATSAF e.V.), the German Institute for Tropical and Subtropical Agriculture (DITSL) in Witzenhausen, and the GIZ Advisory Service on Agricultural Research for Development (BEAF) on behalf of the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development BMZ. In 2015 the two ministries Federal Ministry of Education and Research BMBF in collaboration with the Project Management Jülich PTJ, and the National Aeronautics and Space Research Centre DLR as well as the Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture BMEL in collaboration with the Federal Office for Agriculture and Food BLE organise additional supporting sessions.


The Tropentag has become the most important international conference on development-oriented research in the fields of food security, natural resource management and rural development in central Europe and provides a unique platform for scientific and personal exchange for students, junior and senior scientists, development experts and funding organisations from several countries together with their international partner institutions. Approximately 1200 participant registrations from 80 countries underline the importance of inter- and transdisciplinary scientific exchange to address the challenges ahead of us.


The Tropentag 2015 takes place on the campus of the Humboldt-Universität Berlin from September 16 - 18. It has been jointly organised by the Leibniz Centre for Agricultural Landscape Research ZALF e.V., Müncheberg, and the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin.


The theme of 2015 is ``Management of land use systems for enhanced food security - conflicts, controversies and resolutions''. Food security is still a vital worldwide concern and key policy issue. It will be increasingly challenging to feed a rapidly growing population on a declining area of arable and fertile land under unfavourable and unpredictable climatic conditions. Land has become a precious resource. A growing land use competition for the production of food, fodder & forage, biofuels or forestry goods is creating tensions and conflicts. Especially the poorest nations in tropical regions have the highest prevalence of malnutrition - caused by inconsistent food availability, accessibility, utilisation and stability. The mainly rain-fed, subsistence-oriented smallholder farming systems are extremely vulnerable to environmental stressors and often lack access to inputs and resources, institutional support and, ultimately, adaptive capacity. The highly complex state of vulnerability needs to be addressed encompassing economic and socio-political factors which play a pivotal role in ameliorating food insecurity. Thus, effective adaptation and intervention strategies need to pursue a holistic approach and an array of objectives, including social and economic viability, gender empowerment, improvement of infrastructure and market access as well as soil health, minimum use of scarce water and fossil energy or conservation of natural resources and biodiversity. The issue is marked by a high degree of complexity, interests of stakeholders collide and strategic concepts diverge. Creating a sustainable road map for the future will be a challenging task for our global community. We invite you to discuss possible solutions in an effort to sustainably enhance food and nutritional security in the tropics.


The topics will be addressed by six internationally renowned keynote speakers, via 30 oral sessions presenting more than 160 talks and by about 450 poster presentations in 33 guided poster sessions. A special session featuring the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture IITA will underline the role of the CGIAR in the scope of improving crop quality and productivity through sustainable intensification as well as reducing producer and consumer risks.


We hope that the scientific contributions in this conference book will help you find answers to the research and development questions related to these topics and to the Tropentag 2015 theme.


Our special thanks go to our colleagues, who acted as reviewers and session chairs for the submitted abstracts and thus contributed substantially to maintaining the scientific standard of the conference. We like to express our gratitude to Eric Tielkes, DITSL Witzenhausen. Without his support the conference would not have been possible, and our thanks include all our donors whose financial contributions have made this conference possible and affordable especially for young scientists.



The Leibniz Centre for Agricultural Landscape Research in Müncheberg and the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin welcome you as organisers to Tropentag 2015.



We wish you an enjoyable and rewarding conference.

The local organising committee of Tropentag 2015

Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Bokelmann, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (Berlin)
Dr. Stefan Sieber, Heike Schobert & Karin Stahl, Leibniz Centre for Agricultural
Landscape Research (ZALF, Müncheberg)


and

Anke Wolff	Constance Reif	Jasmin Sauer
Caroline Moraza	Alexandra Penicka	Alexander Rybak
Thomas Aenis	Dirk Pohle	Götz Uckert
Srijna Jha	Harry Hoffmann	Michelle Bonatti
Frieder Graef	Marcos Lana	Meike Pendo Schaefer
Frank Wambura	Srijna Jha	Hannes König
Jane Wambura	Emil Gevorgyan	Katharina Diehl

from HU Berlin and ZALF Müncheberg

Berlin and Müncheberg, September 2015

by 0pt plus 2pt Table of Contentstoc