The educational visit within the course of Agricultural Genetics and Agricultural and Food Microbiology
To fully understand the meaning and importance of agricultural genetic improvement, the students of the Master's Degree course in Food Sciences and Human Nutrition ofUniversità Campus Bio-Medico di Roma they ventured into the Lazio and Marche countryside towards the paths traveled by Nazareno Strampelli. In the places that inspired one of the most important agricultural geneticists, undisputed forerunner of the Green Revolution, an alternative study day was held with the accompaniment of teachers of Agricultural Genetics and Agricultural and Food Microbiology, Luigi Rossi and Annamaria Bevivino, and the presence of Benito Giorgi, agricultural researcher from ENEA “La Casaccia”.
The first stop was in Rieti. Many of the documents on the grains relating to Nazareno Strampelli are in fact preserved in the city's State Archives, where the students had the honor of meeting and speaking one-on-one with the director Roberto Lorenzetti. The meeting made it possible to introduce Strampelli's purely human side: his character and patriotic spirit, his aid to the earthquake victims of Avezzano as well as his dream of improving the conditions of farmers. “He didn't like writing” - Lorenzetti said - “he wrote little, he didn't feel the need to, his beads were enough to speak for him”.
The students were subsequently welcomed by EugenioTassinari, general manager of Agroservice SpA in San Severino Marche, the only company
in the Italian market engaged in research, experimentation and multiplication of seeds for agriculture, in particular cereals and legumes. Here the students learned in practice what genetic improvement consists of and what are the difficulties and activities that a breeders carries out, documenting what Nazareno Strampelli did almost a century ago, that is to obtain grains with high productivity and resistant to disease. The birth of a new variety involves the crossing between two compatible individuals that have at least one of the characteristics of interest. Through selection and new crossings, new varieties of interest to farmers and industry are identified. Lastly, some latest generation varieties resistant to pathogenic and parasitic microorganisms were shown, including the toxigenic fungus of the genus fusarium.
Furthermore, a visit to Strampelli's birthplace, Crispiero, could not be omitted, in order to be able to give at least one last greeting of recognition to the man who made Italy and its grains great in the world.
