Was? Wer? Wo? Wann? Warum? Five Questions to Ask about Agricultural Meteorology

What is agricultural meteorology? Who was engaged in it? Where did it develop? When? And above all, why? In my talk, I will use these W-questions to present my current research project on the history of agricultural meteorology, the discipline which studies the influence of the weather on crop growth and livestock performance. The aim of my project is to investigate how international organisations such as the World Meteorological Organisation and the International Institute of Agriculture contributed to develop agricultural meteorology and what features the discipline had in a few selected countries. In particular, I will pursue in depth a local case study: the history of agricultural meteorology in Great Britain, where the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries set up long- term observational and experimental schemes on weather and crops. In my talk, I will discuss my archival sources and the challenges posed by working at the intersection of the histories of agriculture, meteorology and the environment.

Dr. Giuditta Parolini holds an MSc in the History of Science, Medicine and Technology from Imperial College London and a PhD in Science, Technology, and Humanities from the University of Bologna. She is currently a postdoctoral researcher at TU Berlin, funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG).