Dr. Urs Niggli, who holds the honorary professorship is the Director of the Research Institute for Organic Agriculture (FiBL) in Frick, Switzerland. The interdisciplinary orientated research and teaching in this Institute focus on the future challenges of the agricultural and food sector by identifying consequences for practice, guidelines, institutions, research strategies and politics. The priority lies on public commodities, allocated by multifunctional agriculture, like biodiversity, development of soil fertility or minimising climate change.

Teaching is not about imparting basic disciplinary knowledge on the various topics, but about their networking and application. Of particular interest are the consequences for practice, guidelines and legislation, institutions, research strategy and policy measures in organic farming. Current information from Urs Niggli's international activities (e.g. International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements IFOAM, IFOAM-EU Group, World Food and Agriculture Organization FAO, United Nations Conference on Trade and Development UNCTAD, international FiBL projects) will be included in the lectures. This also gives students an insight into certain future applied professions in the field of research and consultancy.

• Agriculture and international climate policy with special consideration of organic farming.
• Practical examples from research and consulting on how plant protection problems are solved (keywords: fruit growing, viticulture, vegetable growing, biological plant protection, copper replacement, cultivation system optimization versus direct interventions).