IJS 2014 - 3rd International Jujube Symposium

The Third International Jujube Symposium sponsored by the International Society for Horticultural Science (ISHS ) will be held as one of the symposia of the 29th International Horticultural Congress in Brisbane, Australia on 17-22 August, 2014.
The First and the Second International Jujube Symposia were held in China in Baoding and Xinzheng, respectively. Over 400 participants from India, Australia, USA, Brazil, Chile, Israel, Iran, Kuwait, Hungary, Czech Republic, Romania, Slovenia, Tunisia and China attended the symposia.
The family Rhamnaceae, where jujube (Ziziphus) belongs, consists of more than 170 species. They are distributed from the temperate to tropical regions of almost all continents. Chinese jujube (Z. jujuba Mill.) and Indian jujube (Z. mauritiana Lam.) are widely cultivated with a total growing area of over 2 million hectares with an annual production of over 6 million tons. Approximately 30 million farmers rely on jujube production for their livelihood.
Jujube species are becoming increasingly popular because of their outstanding characteristics, including early bearing, rich nutritional and multi-use properties, long flowering season, as well as high tolerance to drought and barren soils.
The aim of this symposium is to provide an international forum on jujube for researchers, academics, business people as well as government officials to discuss sustainable development of jujube throughout the world.
Symposium themes:
Greenhouse management and production systems
Overview
Genetics & Breeding
Cultivation
Disease & Insects
Postharvest treatment and processing
Marketing
Future prospects
Convenors
Dr. Mengjun Liu is Professor at the Research Centre of Chinese Jujube, Agricultural University of Hebei, China, Chair of the ISHS Jujube Working Group and was convenor of the first and second Jujube Symposia.
Dr Guijun Yan is Deputy Leader of the Plant Production System Programme, Institute of Agriculture, The University of Western Australia, Crawley, Perth, W.A., was Chair of the ISHS Ornamental Genetic Resources Working Group, from 2008-2012 and Convenor of the International Conference on Germplasm of Ornamentals (ICGO).
Keynote Speakers
Prof. Mengjun Liu (Research Centre of Chinese Jujube, Agricultural University of Hebei, China) is the chairman of the ISHS Jujube Working Group, and professor of the Research Centre of Chinese Jujube, Agricultural University of Hebei, China. He has engaged in jujube (Ziziphus) research since 1984 and has sound knowledge on the germplasm evaluation, breeding, cultivation, nutrition and processing of jujube. In recognition of his work on jujube, he was awarded the National Prize for Progress on Science and Technology of China in 1996 and 2011.
Prof. J. S. Bal (Punjab Agricultural University, India) is a renowned jujube scientist working on jujube crop for the last forty years. He was elevated to the post of Professor of Horticulture and served as HOD, Horticulture, PAU, Ludhiana(India). Dr. Bal has 156 publications on jujube, written 3 books/bulletins on jujube and received 5 National awards. He has been team leader in jujube crop research since 1993. He earned distinction for evaluating a draft report on genetic resources of jujube by IBPGR, Rome. He is also instrumental in reviving 425 year old historic jujube plants at the Golden Temple, Amritsar (India).
Prof. C. Sudhersan (Kuwait Institute for Scientific Research, Kuwait) trained in India. He joined the Genetic Engineering Laboratory of the Ministry of Agriculture and Water Research Center, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia as Plant Tissue Culture Specialist in 1989 under an FAO contract and served for 7 years. He successfully developed new techniques on date palm micropropagation. He moved from Saudi Arabia to Kuwait in 1996 and joined as a Research Scientist at the Biotechnology Department of the Kuwait Institute for Scientific Research. He has established a date palm tissue culture plant production centre and developed new techniques on micropropagation of date palm, Ziziphus, potato, grape, strawberry, ornamental plants, medicinal plants and native plants. He has successfully utilized micropropagation technology in desert rehabilitation programme in Kuwait. He is the national correspondent of the International Plant Tissue Culture and Biotechnology (IAPTB) for Kuwait.
Scientific Committee
Prof. Mengjun Liu (China)
Dr. Guijun Yan (Austrilia)
Dr. Zhihui Zhao (China)
Prof. J. S. Bal (India)
Prof. Rayappa Appa Balikai (India)
Prof. C. Sudhersan (Kuwait)