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14 December 2020 | Story André Damons
Dr WA Lombard
Dr WA Lombard from the Department of Agricultural Economics in the Faculty of Natural and Agricultural Sciences was a winner of the Joseph F Donnermeyer New Scholar Award from the International Society for the Study of Rural Crime.
A researcher and lecturer from the University of the Free State (UFS) Department of Agricultural Economics has received an international award for his research on the economic impact of stock theft in South Africa.

Dr WA Lombard from this department in the Faculty of Natural and Agricultural Sciences was announced as the winner of the Joseph F Donnermeyer New Scholar Award from the International Society for the Study of Rural Crime (ISSRC) earlier this month (December 2020).

Award for an early-career researcher

Dr Lombard received the award for the research he conducted for the article: ‘Economic impact and factors affecting sheep and goat theft in South Africa’, published in Acta Criminologica: African Journal of Criminology & Victimology. The award is bestowed on an early-career researcher for a publication pertaining to rural criminology during the past 12 months. An early-career researcher is someone who has received a PhD within the past seven years and is showing stable research development.

“Winning this award is a very big honour for me. You always wonder if others view the research you are doing as important. It makes it even more special knowing that researchers from around the world could have won this award. I didn’t think I stood a chance,” said Dr Lombard.

According to him, this was the first award he had entered for after being encouraged by Mr Willie Clark from UNISA’s School for Criminal Justice and chairperson of the Stock Theft Prevention Forum.

Rural-crime research receiving attention

“It is great to know that research conducted by the UFS is considered valuable and of good quality by researchers around the world. It is also good to know that rural-crime research is receiving attention. Many feel this field of research is being neglected,” added Dr Lombard.

The award is named after ISSRC president, Joe Donnermeyer, and acknowledges his many years of work, his pioneering role in rural criminology as a sub-discipline, and his strong and ongoing support and mentorship for emerging academics.

• The other winner is Dr Kate Farhall of the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology and Melbourne Technical College in Australia.

News Archive

Internationally renowned mycologist visits the UFS
2012-05-23

 
Here are, from the left, front: Prof. Pedro Crous and Dr Marieka Gryzenhout (Department of Plant Sciences); at the back: Prof. Zakkie Pretorius (Department of Plant Sciences), Prof. Wijnand Swart (Cluster Director) and Prof. Gert Marais (Department of Plant Sciences).
Photo: Stephen Collett
23 May 2012

The Faculty of Natural and Agricultural Sciences and Strategic Academic Cluster 4 (Technologies for Sustainable Crop Industries in Semi-arid Regions) recently hosted Prof. Pedro Crous, Director of the Centraalbureau voor Schimmelcultures (CBS) in Utrecht, the Netherlands.

CBS is the institution which houses the largest collection of fungal cultures in the world and hosts several internationally renowned fungal systematists. 
 
Prof. Crous is one of the leading mycologists in the world and also one of the pioneers of the international fungal bar-coding movement. His work focuses primarily on plant pathogens of importance to a large number of diverse crops across the world. 
 
In his lecture, entitled “DNA bar-coding of fungal pathogens to enhance trade and food production”, he referred to constraints that face mankind’s quest for secure food sources and how DNA bar-coding can alleviate them. 

According to Prof. Wijnand Swart, Director of the Cluster, collaboration with Prof. Crous and his staff at CBS will hopefully lead to the establishment of a fungal systematics research platform in the Department of Plant Sciences that can provide funding for projects related to plant pathology. 

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