International Ragweed Society

The IRS General Assembly took place during the World Aerobiology Congress presenting an extensive agenda to its members. The World Aerobiology was held at the Radisson Blu Hotel Lietuva in Vilnius, Lithuania, from July 1-5, 2024.

The IRS meeting was chaired by its President Prof László Makra.

The IRS assembly’s agenda included the approval of the minutes from the previous General Assembly, reports on IRS activities, a comprehensive membership overview, and the financial report for 2022, 2023, and 2024 presented by Roberto Albertini. Additionally, Franziska Zemmer delivered the IRS Auditor’s report.

Both reports confirmed no financial problems with a positive financial balance on the IRS Bank account.

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The General Assembly of IRS proclaimed in 2011 that the first Saturday of the summer will be The International Ragweed Day (IRD), to increase understanding and awareness of the problem this invasive weed causes all over the world.

The day was chosen because it is early in the growing season of the plant thereby gives enough time for preparations and actions.

This year, the International Ragweed Day will be on June 22nd. Do not hesitate to share with IRS president (MakraLaszlo@szte.hu) actions and events which will take place in your country!

In France, like every year, ragweed days take place from June 15 to 30, with ragweed-related events organized throughout the country.

This is an opportunity for various organizations to create events to inform and raise awareness of the health, environmental and agricultural problems due to ragweed. Information meetings, training courses, exhibitions, exchanges, collective uprooting, youth activities… Every year, there are a wide variety of events during this period.

The French ragweed observatory will be publishing two new tools:

– a guide to help farmers manage ragweed in agricultural environments (intended for ragweed referents). This guide is designed to familiarize users with the specific problems of ragweed in the agricultural environment, and to suggest management strategies for certain frequently encountered situations.

– a video to help people recognize smooth ragweed!

With the increasing demand for EO data, the EO4EU Project set the objective of providing simplified access to different EO data sources. By leveraging AI/ML, knowledge graphs and other innovative technologies, the recently launched EO4EU Platform enables EO data processing and analysis for a broad range of users. As a result, the Platform offers a rich set of features and tools not only for experts in the field, but also for academia, policy-makers, businesses and the general public.

Interested in learning more?

Register to the ONLINE WORKSHOP and obtain key insights on what the EO4EU Platform has to offer!

The International Ragweed Society is announcing grants to promote the participation of researchers in the conference “World Aerobiology 2024: The 8th European Symposium on Aerobiology, the 12th International Congress on Aerobiology and the 5th International Ragweed Conference”, which will be held in Vilnius (Lithuania) on July 1-5, 2024.

When applying for the grant, priority is given for Early Career Researchers who are individual members of the IRS and come from low-income countries.

Applicants must be present at the conference, and present a talk or a poster, thus submitting an abstract.

The International Ragweed Society offers five grants of 600 Euros each.

Grants will be awarded immediately after the conference.

Applicants have to submit a grant application with the following complementary documents:

1. Motivation letter (not exceeding one page).

2. Abstract of your oral or poster presentation

3. Short CV (not exceeding one page)

4. Support letter (not exceeding half a page) from an IRS member (having paid the 2023-2024 IRS membership fee).

 

Application procedures: all the documents must be sent by 16th of February to the IRS President László Makra (makralaszlo@szte.hu ), using the email Subject: World Aerobiology 2024 Application_last name (i.e. World Aerobiology 2024 Application_Makra).

 

For getting IRS membership for the 2023-2024 period, the membership form is as follows:

https://internationalragweedsociety.org/2023-2024-irs-membership/ 

 

To download the application form, please click here.