Stalin Torres (Venezuela)
Age: 61
Address: Avenida principal Palmarito N5-A. Urbanizacian Lomas de Palmarito, Maracay, Estado Aragua. Venezuela. Zip Code: 2101
E-Mail: ;
Position: Director del Centro de Informacion y Referencia de Suelos(CIRS). Information and Reference Soil Centre, Chief
1. When did you decide to study Soil Science?
I decided to study Soil Science when I Was finishing my career as an Agricultural Engineer and I started to take some orientation courses related to Soil Science. From that moment on began my interest in that discipline.
2. Who had been your most influencial teacher?
My most influencial teacher was Antonio Mayorca, who was my Agrology teacher and who just coming from Belgium where he finished his Magister studies. In addition, when I was studying Agronomy I worked with Dr. Juan Comerma, who further influenced my about my interest to study Soil Science.
3. What do you find most exciting about Soil Science?
The fact that I found most exciting was to recognize the meaning of soil as a support of life on the planet earth, besides that it is a very integral discipline that requires the knowledge of subjects such as climate, geology, geomorphology, crops, land use, vegetation,etc.
4. How would you stimulate teenagers to study Soil Science?
The way to stimulate young people is to strengthen the emphasis about the importance of the soil resource in supporting life on the planet, its impact and importance in aspects as global warming, water production and conservation besides the necessity of preserving the soil for the well being of the future generations as a guarantee of the production of food stuff. We need more innovation practices in the teaching processes.
5. How do you see the future of Soil Science?
The future of our discipline will depend on the effort that each of us can make in our field of endeavor toward a real progress in Soil Science, showing itself as the life saving discipline, studying it more intensively in an integral way including all phenomena in which the soil is involved, particularly everything related to the water cycle and the global warming, the soil as the source and sink (as filter) and not only as a body yielding food. Besides that, a big effort should be made to gain the information that eventually will reach a lot of users and that at the same time it have the possibility to avail the computer's speed and the capability and related technologies as geographic information systems (GIS), to produce useful information for all the users and not only for specialists.