- Email: [email protected]
Dr Peter Frank Prevett, 1933–2013
Journal of Stored Products Research 56 (2014) 8
Contents lists available at ScienceDirect
Journal of Stored Products Research journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jspr
Editorial
Dr Peter Frank Prevett, 1933e2013
Dr Peter F Prevett, tropical stored-product entomologist, died in June this year, following a fall at his home, about two months after his 80th birthday. Peter joined the editorial team of the Journal of Stored Products Research in 1969, four years after the journal’s founding, as Regional Editor for Europe and Africa from then until 1990 e a long span of the Journal’s history and a very considerable personal commitment for just over two decades. He was a punctilious editor and would not accept unclear writing, but his corrections to scripts were always dispensed with great tact, especially to authors whose mother tongue was not English. Like many applied entomologists of that era, his professional interests originated not from formal education but from childhood outdoor pursuits. The boy who had spent his school holidays searching for insects in the fields and woods near his family home progressed through a degree in zoology at Imperial College, London, and joined the Colonial Service in the late 1950s to work for several years in West Africa, firstly in Sierra Leone and then in northern Nigeria. There, he focused on the insects infesting stored grains and other durable products, and took a particular interest in the bruchid beetles infesting stored pulses and groundnuts. He became one of the few world authorities on this beetle family at that time, and he later successfully submitted his research on Nigerian Bruchidae for an external PhD of London University in 1970. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Entomological Society in 1954 and remained so until his death, serving as a member of the RES Council from 1984 to 1986 and as VicePresident during 1986e1987. In the mid-1960s he joined the Tropical Stored Products Centre (TSPC) at Slough and spent the rest of his career working for the
0022-474X/$ e see front matter Ó 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jspr.2013.11.006
successive incarnations of that organization until his retirement in 1993, by which time it had become a Department of the Natural Resources Institute based in Chatham. His professional expertise expanded from the biology of stored-product bruchids (and other pest insects) to broader issues of post-harvest management of food, and his geographical experience widened from West Africa to include South Asia, South-East Asia and South America. In the 1970s and 1980s he was Deputy Head of TSPC (and its subsequent appellations), and he also had long-term responsibility for managing the organization’s substantial training programmes, both in the UK and overseas, and its dissemination activities. He was a key player in the international donor Group for Assistance on Systems relating to Grain After-harvest (GASGA), and for many years he undertook the role of English Secretariat for the Group. In this, as in all else he did, he provided a calm unruffled mainstay for those around him: his gentle sense of humour and his diplomacy helped to develop compromises and soothe differences. He is remembered with great respect by those who knew him in the international stored-product community, both for his scientific contribution to our knowledge of storage pest biology and control, and for his considerable role as a facilitator of international donor co-operation in grain storage technology. Chris Haines Emeritus Professor of Post-Harvest Technology, Natural Resources Institute, University of Greenwich, Central Avenue, Chatham Maritime, Kent ME4 4TB, United Kingdom E-mail address: [email protected].
Contents lists available at ScienceDirect
Journal of Stored Products Research journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jspr
Editorial
Dr Peter Frank Prevett, 1933e2013
Dr Peter F Prevett, tropical stored-product entomologist, died in June this year, following a fall at his home, about two months after his 80th birthday. Peter joined the editorial team of the Journal of Stored Products Research in 1969, four years after the journal’s founding, as Regional Editor for Europe and Africa from then until 1990 e a long span of the Journal’s history and a very considerable personal commitment for just over two decades. He was a punctilious editor and would not accept unclear writing, but his corrections to scripts were always dispensed with great tact, especially to authors whose mother tongue was not English. Like many applied entomologists of that era, his professional interests originated not from formal education but from childhood outdoor pursuits. The boy who had spent his school holidays searching for insects in the fields and woods near his family home progressed through a degree in zoology at Imperial College, London, and joined the Colonial Service in the late 1950s to work for several years in West Africa, firstly in Sierra Leone and then in northern Nigeria. There, he focused on the insects infesting stored grains and other durable products, and took a particular interest in the bruchid beetles infesting stored pulses and groundnuts. He became one of the few world authorities on this beetle family at that time, and he later successfully submitted his research on Nigerian Bruchidae for an external PhD of London University in 1970. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Entomological Society in 1954 and remained so until his death, serving as a member of the RES Council from 1984 to 1986 and as VicePresident during 1986e1987. In the mid-1960s he joined the Tropical Stored Products Centre (TSPC) at Slough and spent the rest of his career working for the
0022-474X/$ e see front matter Ó 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jspr.2013.11.006
successive incarnations of that organization until his retirement in 1993, by which time it had become a Department of the Natural Resources Institute based in Chatham. His professional expertise expanded from the biology of stored-product bruchids (and other pest insects) to broader issues of post-harvest management of food, and his geographical experience widened from West Africa to include South Asia, South-East Asia and South America. In the 1970s and 1980s he was Deputy Head of TSPC (and its subsequent appellations), and he also had long-term responsibility for managing the organization’s substantial training programmes, both in the UK and overseas, and its dissemination activities. He was a key player in the international donor Group for Assistance on Systems relating to Grain After-harvest (GASGA), and for many years he undertook the role of English Secretariat for the Group. In this, as in all else he did, he provided a calm unruffled mainstay for those around him: his gentle sense of humour and his diplomacy helped to develop compromises and soothe differences. He is remembered with great respect by those who knew him in the international stored-product community, both for his scientific contribution to our knowledge of storage pest biology and control, and for his considerable role as a facilitator of international donor co-operation in grain storage technology. Chris Haines Emeritus Professor of Post-Harvest Technology, Natural Resources Institute, University of Greenwich, Central Avenue, Chatham Maritime, Kent ME4 4TB, United Kingdom E-mail address: [email protected].