Jose Maria Albareda
- Category : 1902-births
- Type : MGP
- Profile : 5/1 - Heretical / Investigator
- Definition : Split - Small (11)
- Incarnation Cross : LAX Limitation 1
Biography
Spanish soil scientist and science administrator. From its 1939 creation by Francoist Spain to his 1966 death, he was the Secretary General and head of the Higher Council of Scientific Research (CSIC), the main Spanish scientific institution.
He made compatible his functions of government and promotion of national scientific research with a very brilliant investigative work. The Institute of Edaphology , which he founded and directed, was the seed of an important research school that spread throughout the country, both in the university chairs whose holders had been trained at the Institute, and in the creation of Centers for Edaphology and Agrobiology. The research work of these centers on scientific fields related to agriculture and agrarian economy had repercussions through the Guidance and Technical Assistance Institutes, promoted by Albareda, in coordination with local corporations.
He was one of the first numerary members of the Opus Dei (since 1937), and he was a close friend of its founder Josemaría Escrivá. He was eventually ordained a priest in 1959 although he continued all his professional activity, in which he achieved many honors and distinctions: Academic of the Royal Academies of Pharmacy , Sciences and Medicine of Madrid, of the Pontifical of Rome, of the Sciences of Barcelona and Saragossa. Member of the Stockholm Academy of Engineers and of numerous foreign associations. In 1960 he was appointed the first President of the University of Navarra.
He died 26 February 1966, Madrid.