Grassland Society presents 60th congress

The 60th Congress of the Grassland Society of Southern Africa (GSSA) was recently held in Hilton, KwaZulu-Natal, drawing around 160 delegates from across Southern Africa.

- By Izak Hofmeyr

The programme also featured local and international speakers from the United Kingdom, Kenya, the United States, and Benin.

According to Prof Kevin Kirkman, chair of the organising committee, the GSSA was founded in Pietermaritzburg in 1966, and milestone congresses are traditionally hosted in or near the city.

Celebrating excellence

South Africa has a vibrant scientific community in the rangeland field, Prof Kirkman noted, and the congress provided an important platform for researchers to share their work. The organising committee received a large number of submissions to choose from.

The programme offered three presentation formats: standard 15-minute talks, poster sessions, and a new five-minute format designed to give researchers a chance to present to a broader audience than posters typically reach. As a hybrid event, the congress also allowed remote participation, extending the reach of these sessions.

This year’s programme was organised around key themes covering arid and desert ecosystems, biodiversity and conservation, climate change and carbon, communal rangelands, fire ecology, invasive species, livestock and game management, cultivated pastures and feeding ecology, and rangeland ecology, management, and restoration.

Two full-day workshops were also presented: one on publishing and editing skills for ecology researchers and practitioners, and another on nature-based solutions in rangeland management.

Awards and leadership

A highlight of the congress was the gala dinner and awards evening, where outgoing president Dr Ntuthuko Mkhize of the University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN) formally handed over the reins to the newly elected president, Dr Michelle Tedder, also from UKZN.