Dieter Wienberg, the man who revolutionised agriculture in the south of Spain, dies

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 died. He passed away on Monday 18 December in Baden-Baden (Germany). He was 94.

Dieter Wienberg was born on 14 June 1929 in Thuringia (Germany) 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).

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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.

New bean varieties were introduced and work began on hybrid tomatoes. In 1966, after a trip to California, he brought back new techniques for growing strawberries as well as new varieties, revolutionising agriculture in Huelva. He also introduced a new crop that was largely unheard of in Spain at the time and which would go on to transform agriculture in Andalucía: the avocado.

The increased demand for agricultural workers at the time saw more women entering the workforce, to meet the demand for Andalusian strawberries.

After his tenure as director of La Mayora, Wienberg returned to Germany where he worked for the country’s ministry of agriculture. He holds a number of titles including the Spanish Order of Agricultural Merit, the Order of Alfonso X the Wise, the Portuguese Order of Agricultural Merit, the Italian Order of Civil Merit and the German Order of Civil Merit.

On 23 May 2016 Wienberg was awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of Malaga and 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.

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In a press release the staff at La Mayora UMA-CSIC conveyed their deepest condolences to Wienberg’s family.