Dieter Wienberg, the first director of the La Mayora Experimental Station (now the Institute of Subtropical and Mediterranean Horticulture (IHSM) La Mayora UMA-CSIC) in Algarrobo in the Axarquía, has passed away on Monday 18 December in Baden-Baden (Germany), at the age of 94.
Dieter Wienberg was born on 14 June 1929 in Thuringia and was an agricultural engineer with a doctorate in economic sciences, magna cum laude. In August 1954 he moved to Zaragoza with a Spanish-German exchange scholarship to the National Institute of Colonisation and in January 1955 he joined the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC).
Wienberg was one of the driving forces behind the bilateral agreement for Spanish-German collaboration at La Mayora, which was signed in 1961 at Spain’s ministry of foreign affairs and the CSIC bought La Mayora estate on which the research centre in Algarrobo (Malaga) is located today.
Wienberg was appointed director of this new agricultural research centre, where he remained until the end of the Spanish-German collaboration agreement at the end of 1976. In 1961, La Mayora exported its first strawberry by plane. In 1962, under Wienberg’s leadership, the first large-scale tomato production trials began in Almeria, destined for export.
Among many other projects, he introduced a new crop that was largely unheard of in the country at the time and which would go on to transform agriculture in Andalucía: the avocado
On 23 May 2016, Wienberg was awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of Malaga. On 10 March 2017, Algarrobo town hall named the avenue leading to La Mayora after him. He was made a fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering on 22 February 2023.
Source: surinenglish.com