History and Administration
Founding of the society
During the end of the 1940s Nordic plant physiologists faced difficulties in getting their work published in international journals. As a result, a swedish intiative to establish a new society gained wide support among the researchers in Scandinavia. A preliminary meeting was held in Stockholm in May, 1947, which resulted in a founding meeting held on October 27-28th, 1947, in Copenhagen with representatives from Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden.
It was decided to establish an organization called Nordisk Förening för Fysiologisk Botanik, later to become Societas Physiologiae Plantarum Scandinavica. The aim of the society should be to arrange regular scientific conferences and to publish the journal Physiologia Plantarum, established in 1948. Professor Hans G. Burström from Lund was appointed editor-in-chief of the journal, a position that he administered for 22 years.
Administration
The society is administered by a Council appointed by the General Assembly of the society, which gathers every second year in connection to the SPPS congress. The location of assemblies alternates between the Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden, which are all represented in the Council. The composition of Council has varied over the decades and currently consists of President, Vice-presicent, Treasurer, Secretary general, Journal responsible, and PhD/Postdoc representative, in addition to two ordinary council members.
The presidency of the society rotates between the countries and there is a limit on the number of times a person can be elected President. The position of a part-time Society secretary (employed between 2015 and 2024) has been vacant since August 2024.
The journal Physiologia Plantarum has been an integral part of the society from the beginning with an appointed editorial board from the first adminstration in 1948. From 1976, a separate Journal committee was established to govern the journal. This committee was dissolved in 2005 whereafter one member of the council is elected as Journal responsible. Editorial tasks of the journal have always been carried out in Lund despite the fact that the current editor-in-chief and a part of the editorial team work from other locations.
