The third PMT meeting was held on March 20th – 21st, 2014, at the Royal Veterinary College in London and organized by Prof. Dirk Pfeiffer and his collaborators. The meeting was opened to Contract Managers and to work-package leaders, task leaders and to a few other collaborators in the project. Forty one delegates from the eighteen Partners of the Consortium attended the meeting.
During the opening session the Coordinator (Prof. Carlos Martins) addressed an overall review on the major goals and guidelines for the meeting

Objectives of the meeting

The participants of the project gathered to summarize the work developed until the previous FCM in Cagliari and to mainly discuss the work progress up to the current meeting with particular emphasis to achievements and attainment of deliverables and milestones identified in Annex I (to be concluded by month 18), and perspectives on the progress of the work to be conducted up to month 24 (Full consortium meeting 2014 to be held at CIRAD Montpellier, France) and up to the end of the project.

Besides presentation and discussion of the project progress, the event was also a good opportunity for the reinforcement of interactions for the work development and the stimulation of production of scientific publications.
Administrative and financial aspects on the project progress and reporting were reviewed and updated.

Organization

The meeting was organized on two parallel sessions chaired by the Theme Leaders and Co-Leaders (common session for Themes 2 and 3, independent session for Theme 4), to review interim results, to identify delays or deviations and strategies to overcome them, to reinforce collaborative agreements for the work development of different Tasks within each Theme.
During parallel sessions, organized as round table discussions, Theme Leaders confirmed the main strategies for the development of different tasks and provided the opportunity for oral presentations of WP leaders and/or task leaders to introduce a comprehensive overview (oral presentations) of the work developed since the Kickoff Meeting.

Ongoing work under Theme 1 and Theme 5 were presented and discussed during plenary sessions.

Fruitful discussions took place. Collaborations needed for the completion of work was strengthened. During a final joint session of the meeting, each Theme Leader presented a brief summary of conclusions taken during the different work sessions (work accomplished as well as on the work to be pursued within each Theme).

Very promising results on the work developed and fruitful collaborations anticipate a successful continuation of the project.

A social dinner was organized on a traditional restaurant allowing a friendly and relaxing atmosphere among participants.