This morning, the Palau de la Música Catalana hosted the official ceremony celebrating the 40th anniversary of IRTA, a public company affiliated with the Department of Agriculture, Livestock, Fisheries and Food of the Government of Catalonia. Since 1985, IRTA has been generating knowledge to serve the agri-food sector, public administrations, and citizens, with the aim of contributing to the sustainability and prosperity of food systems and to the well-being of the population.
The celebration brought together three hundred representatives from agri-food companies and organizations; universities; research centers from Catalonia, Spain, and abroad; and public administrations from both Catalonia and the Spanish State. The President of the Government of Catalonia, the Hon. Mr. Salvador Illa i Roca, closed the event, emphasizing that “Catalonia will always stand by science and research and has a pro-science government. Alongside such an essential sector as agri-food, there must be a strong public scientific sector to support it.”
For her part, the Secretary of State for Agriculture and Food at the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, Ms. Begoña García Bernal, who spoke at the beginning of the event, highlighted that “the IRTA symbolizes a way of understanding the territory and doing science with purpose, in the service of transforming the rural world towards a more sustainable, fair, and innovative future. Essentially, it means leaving no one behind and contributing to improving people's lives.”
The Minister of Agriculture, Livestock, Fisheries and Food of the Government of Catalonia, and president of IRTA, the Hon. Mr. Òscar Ordeig i Molist, was in charge of opening the celebration and explained that “the challenges of the agri-food sector, the leading sector of our territory’s economy, are numerous and fast-paced: how we generate knowledge and how we adapt to the many changes to come are just examples. And we will only be able to face them with science, technology, and knowledge, hand in hand with the best experts, such as IRTA.”
The Director General of IRTA, Josep Usall i Rodié, reviewed the past and present of the organization, which currently has more than one thousand professionals across nearly twenty centers throughout Catalonia, making it one of the largest research institutions in both Catalonia and Spain.
Usall highlighted the strong connection that IRTA has always had with the territory and the sector, and emphasized that current global challenges—such as climate change, the digital revolution, or emerging biological risks—require research and innovation with a global outlook adapted to each territory. “Today, maintaining our mission and standing by the agri-food sector means tackling global challenges from a local perspective,” he said. “More than changes, we are talking about a transformation of food systems, and at IRTA, we see this as a great opportunity,” he insisted.
Regarding future priorities, Usall emphasized the importance of renovating and modernizing facilities, as well as launching new strategic infrastructures that will enable IRTA to continue leading agri-food research in the country and to maintain its international standing.
Among these investments, between €22 and €25 million will be allocated, starting from the third quarter of this year, to build and equip a new singular infrastructure for strategic experimentation in global health in Catalonia, located at the Animal Health Research Centre (IRTA-CReSA), on the campus of the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB).
It is the new biosafety level 3 experimentation unit for the study of emerging and re-emerging infectious agents. This infrastructure will allow professionals from IRTA, as well as from other research centers in Catalonia or abroad, to safely experiment with microorganisms that are virulent for human or animal health, such as zoonotic influenzas (transmitted from animals to humans), SARS, and other zoonotic coronaviruses. They will also be able to experiment with insects that can act as vectors of contagion, such as mosquitoes that transmit West Nile fever or dengue viruses.
In fact, the new unit will include an insectarium with two walk-in climate chambers—an unprecedented infrastructure in Catalonia and practically unique in Spain.
Although IRTA-CReSA currently has biosafety level 3 facilities, the new unit, with nearly 3,000 m² of built space, will expand its capacity and research possibilities. This is considered essential in the current context of climate change, globalization, and intensification of agri-food production, which favor the emergence and spread of outbreaks and infectious diseases that have a direct impact on food safety, the agri-food sector’s economy, and the health of ecosystems, animals, and people—all of which are interconnected.
During the COVID pandemic, which highlighted the close relationship between animal health and human health, numerous research institutions and companies requested the spaces and technical expertise of CReSA to conduct investigations. It then became clear how necessary it was to have a facility like the one now being built. “This new infrastructure aims to be Catalonia’s biosafety HUB, to host all research related to pathogens that require high biosafety levels, and to work together for global health,” Usall summarized.
During the celebration event, there was also time to discuss research and innovation and to showcase success stories where IRTA’s research has contributed to transforming and improving the activities of Catalan companies and organizations.
Here are some more photos from the event:
