WELCOME

It is a great honour for me to welcome you all to Italy and to Pisa, and at the same time to express my warmest thanks for your attendance at the First International Symposium on Water Relations in Fruit Crops.

I am delighted that we have participants from several countries, and in particular for the presence of Professor Scaramuzzi, President of the Italian Society for Horticultural Science, and Vice-President of the I.S.H.S.

Ladies and Gentlemen, when at the XXI INternational Horticultural Congress held in Hamburg in 1982, a group of scientists asked me to act as convener for this symposium, I could not have imagined such a numerous and above all qualified attendance. This represents tangible proof of the importance of the subject, and of the interest aroused by the topics which will be discussed and illustrated during the meeting by various specialists, to whom I wish to express my gratitude and most sincere thanks in anticipation.

I believe it is my duty to emphasize one particular aspect of this meeting: in organising the Symposium, we proposed to confront the experience and findings of physiologists, botanists, agronomists and pomologists; specialists from these disciplines do not often have the opportunity to get together to discuss problems which they have in common, but which they tackle from different points of view.

With this Symposium, in fact, it is our intention to verify the scope of these interests and to submit to the I.S.H.S. the constitution of a working group named "Water Relations in Horticultural Crops".

In such a working group, we would have the permanent means for an effective exchange of ideas and information among researchers working at different levels in various scientific institutions, currently having scarce means for collaboration and also for stimulating interdisciplinary research programmes, permitting a greater understanding of the relationship between water physiology and plant productivity.

This is the spirit with which the scientific committee has organized this meeting and I sincerely hope that it will prove fruitful ans successful.

Before concluding, please allow me to thank all those who have so generously made financial contributions, allowing us to organize this Symposium.

Of these I would like to mention in particular:

• Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Department for Cooperation and Development;
• National Council of Researches;
• the University of Pisa.

Finally, I would like to wish all the participants a very pleasant stay here in Pisa, and I hope in particular that our foreign guests feel at home and enjoy the duration of their stay in this country.

F.Loreti

Convener


ADDRESS

It is a great honour for me, Ladies and Gentlemen, to welcome you on behalf of the International Society for Horticultural Science (ISHS) and of the Italian Horticultural Society (SOI), and to thank Professor Loreti for having taken on the burden of organizing the First International Symposium on Water Relations in Fruit Crops here in Pisa.

This topic is one which has come to be of primary importance in recent years, and one which involves experts from many nations.

The Symposia organized by the ISHS are now looked upon by all the scientific world as reference points in the development of scientific research in various sectors of horticulture.

The Symposium organized by Professor Loreti has a special feature distinguishing it from the others: he has managed to gather together, for the first time, researchers who tackle problems of relationships between water and plant productivity from two different points of view - physiological and agronomical - with the aim of enriching knowledge of soil-water-plant-atmosphere relations and thus aim for a more sufficient use of water in agriculture.

I wish to remind you . on this occasion, that the activities of the ISHS and of the SOI, founded 31 years ago, are very similar; I would go so far as to say that the two are interdependent. Both Societies have substantially the same type of organization and structure, and both pursue common aims, those of promoting study, research and any other initiative dedicated to the furtherance of scientific and technological progress in horticulture on both national and international bases.

This is why initiatives like this one find the ISHS and the Soi collaborating with the various bodies which have generously offered their financial support.

The SOI, within an intensive programme of activities in the form of a series of scientific and promotional initiatives has now taken on a further major commitment, That of organizing the 23rd International Horticultural Congress, to be held, after that in Davis, USA, in Italy in 1990.

Finally, I wish to thank the impressively and qualified researchers who are going to present papers, and all of you present here to take an active part in the dense programme of papers and reports over the three days.

Thank you.

F.Scaramuzzi
Vice-President of International Society for Horticultural
Science
President of the Italian Horticultural Society