Bärbel Gerowitt is professor for Crop Health at the University of Rostock in Germany since 2004. Before that she managed the Research Centre Agriculture and the Environment at the University of Göttingen. She is specialised in weed research and interdisciplinary concepts to evaluate plant health strategies in arable crops. In Rostock, she teaches all aspects of plant health and plant protection in arable crops. In her research, she focuses the relationship between agrobiodiversity and healthy crops. Both planned and unplanned agrobiodiversity is investigated. Within unplanned agrobiodiversity weeds receive the major interest. Experiments on population dynamics and on the influence of cropping practices on weeds are carried out to develop and support integrated weed management concepts as well as land use concepts to enhance biodiversity. On-farm research and transdisciplinary projects are undertaken to further integrate biodiversity goals into farming practice. Genetic diversity in weeds and the management of herbicide resistance is investigated with respect to spatial occurrences and developments. Imbedding research on plant protection strategies into a landscape context completes the focus. These issues fit well into the IOBC working group “Landscape management for functional biodiversity”.
She is also member of the board and scientific committee of the European Weed Research Society, and convenor of the EWRS Working Group Weeds and Biodiversity. In Germany, she is chairperson of the Advisory Board on Biodiversity and Genetic Resources of the German Minister of Consumer Protection, Food and Agriculture and she works in the German Society of Phytomedicine (DPG) in the working group Herbology. She is also member of the German Expert Committee on Pesticide Resistance - Working Group Herbicides (ECPR – H) and she is chairperson of the Working Committee "System Evaluation" of the German Association for Technology and Structures in Agriculture (KTBL).
