NSSA Symposium 2021

Dear NSSA member,

As the new president of the NSSA, I would like to thank the previous NSSA EB committee for their commitment and hard work over the last term. They did a great job during some challenging times. Some of them have been there for a long time and they made things work seamlessly and effortlessly. I would also like to thank the symposium organizing committee once again for the work they did. They pulled of a great symposium in very trying times and with considerably less funding.

“You did a stunning job and I believe everyone enjoyed the high quality presentations; the opportunity to be together and communicate face to face and the lovely scenery. Thank you! “

I am excited to work together with the new EB and cannot wait to get things going.

“Welcome Annika, Danny, Driekie, Lené, Prabashnie, Raymond to our new committee. Let us make a difference.“

I wrote down the pressing matters mentioned during the annual meeting and we will try our best to deal with all of them.

We currently have two workshops planned. The first will guide us through the SACNASP CPD website so that we can understand the process and complete the portfolio of evidence required for us to meet our CPD requirements. Prabashnie will lead that workshop. It will be an interactive online workshop and will be conducted sooner rather than later.

The second workshop to be planned is about ‘cover crops’. During our 23^rd NSSA conference it became obvious that many of us are working on cover crops and it would be good if we could bring together all the information gathered over the years. We could then combine it into a working document that can be used by all of us. That will be planned for sometime next year.

If anyone has any ideas for any other workshops, please share it with us.

Send suggestions to Annika.

We were requested to have more regular meetings and this is something we can definitely organize especially if we use the virtual platform. We can discuss current affairs and maybe raise the issue of membership fees again.

Another aspect that is important for the nematology fraternity and therefore for the NSSA is the registration and commercialization of a local EPN isolate. During our EPN workshop, it became clear that there are two aspects to be solved:

1. Formulation of a local EPN product
2. Registration of this local EPN product

A separate set of communication will be sent out to address this.

We should also get the young scientists and students more interested in the NSSA. We can make the NSSA a more dynamic platform with some competitions or other activities during our 2-year term. But we also need additional inputs from the younger generation! Raymond has already started a WhatsApp group for the EB and I believe that the young scientists have also started their own chat channel. This is great and with Raymond being the link between the two groups we can communicate easily.

Thank you for supporting the NSSA and talk to you soon.

Kind regards

Mieke Daneel

President NSSA