Kamil SINDIR of EGE University, Turkiye

“How far is precision agriculture technology from meeting its promises?”
Kamil Okyay SINDIR, PhD
kamil.sindir@ege.edu.tr; ksindir@gmail.com
Professor,
Ege University, Faculty of Agriculture, Department of Agricultural Machinery and Technologies Engineering, Bornova, Izmir, Türkiye

Biography:

Kamil Okyay Sindir, born in Bornova, Izmir, Turkiye, has been a senior lecturer since 1987 and a full professor since 2004 at the Ege University, Faculty of Agriculture, Department of Agricultural Machinery and Technologies Engineering where he received his BEng degree in 1984, and MSc degree in 1989. Later, PhD in 1993 at the Cranfield University, UK. Served as the president of the Turkish Chamber of Agricultural Engineers for 14 years and chaired the board of the Union of Turkish Chambers of Engineers and Architects in Izmir. Sındır has worked as the Executive Committee Member of the Agricultural Applications and Research Center of Ege University. He also represented Turkiye at the EFITA (European Federation of Information Technology in Agriculture) and the International Committee of Agricultural Engineers (CIGR). Sındır was the founder coordinator and the first president of the Association of Agricultural Engineers in Southeastern Europe (AESEE), from 2007 to 2010. Between 2008 and 2010, he was elected to the Executive Board of the National Olive and Olive Oil Council. Served as the reporter of the Committee of Agricultural Machinery and Implements and Committee of Tractors to the 7th and 8th Five Year Development Plans of Turkiye. He also worked at the Monitoring Committee of the Turkish Informatics Society and chaired the Agricultural Informatics WG of the Society.

He was elected as the Mayor of Bornova District of Izmir in March 2009 and later represented Izmir province at the Grand National Assembly of Turkiye (GNAT) as the Deputy (Member of Parliament) until 2023. He is also actively involved in the Agriculture, Forestry and Rural Affairs Committee, Planning and Budget Committee, Research Committees on Viticulture, Addiction on Information Technologies, Earthquakes, Aquaculture and Fisheries at the GNAT, NATO Parliamentary Assembly (NATO PA), Vice President of the Science and Technology Committee (STC) of the NATO PA and also the Sub-Committee on Technology Trends and Security (TTS) of the STC. He also acted as the Vice President of the European Energy Cities Association.

Sındır has written 6 books, 1 chapter in an international book (CIGR Handbook Volume VI – Information Technology), and more than 130 international scientific papers, publications, and articles in numerous journals, newspapers and virtual media. Sındır’s scientific expertise and major fields of interest are; Planning and Management, Operations Research, CPM/PERT, Precision Farming, Agriculture 4.0, Spatial/satellite technologies, Geographical Information Systems (GIS), Remote Sensing, Informatics and Communication Technologies, Food Safety and Security, Sustainable Energy Resources and Technologies, Energy Transition, Energy Productivity and Saving.

Address:Izmir, Türkiye

Valeri Mladenov of University of Sofia, Bulgaria

“Enabling energy systems flexibility provision by all actors and sectors through markets and digital technologies”

Valeri MLADENOV, DSc.
valerim@tu-sofia.bg; v.mladenov@ieee.bg
Professor, 
Technical University of Sofia, Sofia, Bulgaria

Biography:

Valeri Mladenov received his Ph.D. from the Technical University of Sofia (TU Sofia), Bulgaria in 1993. In 2019 he defended a "Doctor of Sciences" thesis at the same institution. In 2004 he became the head of the department Fundamentals of Electrical Engineering. Since June 2011 he has been a Dean of Faculty of Automatics, since Dec. 2011 he has been a Vice-Rector of TU Sofia. Currently, he is Head of the Department of Fundamentals of Electrical Engineering and Head of the Neurocomputing Laboratory of TU-Sofia. He is a guest lecturer at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Eindhoven University of Technology, in the Netherlands, and many others.

Prof. Mladenov's research interests are in the fields of electrical engineering, artificial intelligence, neural networks, power systems, and electronics. He has received many international research fellowships. He has more than 350 scientific papers in professional journals and conferences. He is a co-author of twenty books and manuals for students. He had received many research grants and also with his team he participated and participated in many national and international projects - H2020, FP7, Royal Society, DFG, NWO, Erasmus+, and others.

As a member of several editorial boards, Prof. Mladenov serves as an editor-in-chief, associate editor, and reviewer for several professional journals and conferences. He is a Senior Member of IEEE, a member of the IEEE Circuit and Systems Technical Committee (TC) on Cellular Nonlinear Networks and Memristor Array Computing (CNN-MAC), and an Educational Activities Officer of the Bulgarian IEEE section. He is also a Senior Member of the International Neural Networks Society (INNS), a Member of the International Council of Large Electric Systems, (SIGRE), a member of the Steering Committee of the International Symposium on Theoretical Electrical Engineering (ISTET), a member of the Management Boards of the Scientific and Technical Union of the Power Engineers, and the Union of Automation and Informatics in Bulgaria.

Address:Sofia, Bulgaria

Valentin VLĂDUŢ of INMA Bucharest, Romania

“Precision agriculture trends in the context of climate changes”

Nicolae-Valentin VLĂDUŢ, Ph.D.
General Director, 
The National Institute of Research – Development for Machines and Installations Designed for Agriculture and Food Industry – INMA Bucharest, Romania

Biography:

Nicolae-Valentin Vlăduţ is General Director at INMA Bucharest and Associate Professor at UNST UP Bucharest. He received his MSc, and PhD from the National University for Science and Technology “U.P. Bucharest”, Romania. During his professional career, he has been the Head of the Testing Department and Scientific Director at INMA Bucharest. His research interests include Agriculture technologies, Construction of machines, Bioeconomy, Sustainable agriculture, Conservative agriculture, Renewable resources, Agri-Environment, Agro-Food, etc. He also published more than 160 articles indexed in WoS journals and conference proceedings with hundreds of citations, has 6 patents, 22 patent applications, 35 books, and over 140 prizes, medals, and diplomas obtained at international fairs of inventions, prizes of the Agricultural and Forestry Academy, etc. He is Member of the editorial board of journals: INMATEH - Agricultural Engineering (Romania), HUNGARIAN AGRICULTURAL ENGINEERING (Hungary), "AGRICULTURAL MACHINES" Journal - ACM (Ukraine), BLACK SEA JOURNAL OF AGRICULTURE (Turkey), ECOLOGICA (Serbia), ACTA TECHNICA CORVINIESIS - BULLETIN OF ENGINEERING  (Romania); ANNALS OF FACULTY ENGINEERING HUNEDOARA - INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF ENGINEERING (Romania), ISB-INMA TEH - International Symposium (Romania), International Symposium “Environment and Industry” – SIMI (Romania), The International Conference on Hydraulics, Pneumatics, Sealing Elements, Precision Mechanics, Tools, Specific Electronic Equipment & Mechatronics – HERVEX (Romania), International Symposium "Actual Tasks on Agricultural Engineering" (Croatia), Journal of Scientific Society of POWER MACHINES, TRACTORS AND MAINTENANCE (Serbia), etc.

Address:Bucharest, Romania

Todor Stoilov of Institute of Information and Communication Technologies – Bulgarian Academy of Sciences

“Business decision-making in husbandry management”

Todor STOILOV, DSc.
todor.stoilov@iict.bas.bg
Professor, 
Institute of Information and Communication Technologies – Bulgarian Academy of Sciences 

Biography:

Todor Stoilov, DSc, Ph.D., Eng. is currently working as a Professor at the Institute of Information and Communication Technologies – Bulgarian Academy of Sciences. He is a control engineer, who graduated from the Technical University of Sofia, Bulgaria. He defended his Ph.D. thesis titled “Engineering Design of complex systems”. The next higher academic level for a Doctor of Science (DSc) degree was defended with a doctoral thesis titled “Real-time Coordination in hierarchical systems”. He participated in more than 100 international and national projects funded by the European Commission, Bulgarian National Scientific Fund, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, etc. His list of publications includes more than 400 scientific publications including 6 monographs, 9 chapters in international books, papers in scientific journals, and proceedings of international events. The list of internationally recognized citations is more than 600.   He has active educational activities in several Bulgarian Universities with courses, related to optimal control, decision-making, and portfolio optimization. He has been invited as a visiting professor in universities abroad. His main research interests include optimization, automatic control, control of transportation systems; portfolio optimization, financial investments, decision-making in husbandry management, and e-services in different domains.

Address:Sofia, Bulgaria