Invited Speakers

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    • Pete Smith

    University of Aberdeen

    Title：Looking after soils so that they can look after us

    Biography:

    Prof. Pete Smith (UK) is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Biology, a Fellow of the Institute of Soil Scientists, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, a Foreign Fellow of the Indian National Science Academy, a Fellow of the European Science Academy, and a Fellow of the Royal Society (London). He is Professor of Soils and Global Change at the University of Aberdeen, Science Director of the Scottish Climate Change Centre of Expertise (ClimateXChange) and Distinguished Visiting Professor at Tsinghua University (Beijing, PR China).

    Prof. Smith earned his PhD from the University of Reading in 1991, and worked at the UK Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food and Rothamsted Research. His academic career has focused on applying soil science and biogeochemical modelling in interdisciplinary projects covering with the aim of raising the profile of soils as a necessary component of wider projects and to promote policy action.

    Among many other bodies, he has served as a member of the UN FAO International Technical Panel on Soils (2022-2024), the Science and Technical Committee for the International 4per1000 initiative (2016-2018) and over the years has served as a convening lead author for the IPCC, IPBES and the FAO/ITPS.

    Prof. Smith’s contributions have garnered widespread acclaim and numerous prestigious honors, including a Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Award (2008), the John S. Waid Award for the best Review in Soil Biology & Biochemistry (2012), the British Ecological Society Marsh Award for Climate Change Research (2014), the European Geosciences Union Philippe Duchaufour Medal (2017) and the Blaise Pascal Medal for exceptional contributions in Earth & Environmental Sciences, European Academy of Sciences (2024).

    He is a highly prolific researcher, publishing over 850 journal articles, which have been cited over 82,000 times (>158,000 GS), giving him an h-index of 149 (Clarivate) / 190 (GS). He has been listed as a Highly Cited Researcher each year since 2014, and since 2019 in two categories (Environment & Ecology, and Agricultural Sciences).