SUMMARY Report and Minutes

Transcription

1 Summary Report, v.1 4 th ESSP SC Meeting, Bonn, 2010 SUMMARY Report and Minutes 4th ESSP Scientific Committee Meeting April 2010, Bonn, Germany A Partnership in Earth System Science - community building for new science insights

2 Summary Report, v.1 4 th ESSP SC Meeting, Bonn, 2010 Participants Present Ailikun, Director, MAIRS Ghassem Asrar, Director, WCRP Janos Bogardi, Executive Officer Global Water System Project Bruce Campbell, Director CCAFS Secretariat (via Skype) Deliang Chen, Executive Director, ICSU Anantha Duraiappah, Executive Director, IHDP Secretariat Ada Ignaciuk, ESSP Science Officer John Ingram, Executive Officer, GECAFS IPO (via Skype) Anne Larigauderie, Executive Director, DIVERSITAS Rik Leemans, Chair, ESSP SC Corrine Le Quéré, Co-Chair, GCP SSC Diana Liverman, Chair, GECAFS SAC (via Skype) Jerry M. Melillo, ICSU-appointed member Carlos Nobre, Chair, IGBP SC Anand Patwardhan, Co-Chair, GCP SSC (via Skype) Xizhe Peng, Director Institute of Population Research Martin Rice, ESSP Coordinator Falk Schmidt, Academic Officer, IHDP Sybil Seitzinger, Executive Director, IGBP (via Skype) Lucilla Spini Project Officer, GECHH Charles Vörösmarty, Co-Chair, GWSP SSC Oran Young, Chair, IHDP SC Invited Participants Zafar Adeel Director United Nations University - International Network on Water, Apologies Johan Rockstrom Executive Director Stockholm Environment Institute and Stockholm Resilience Centre, Konrad Vielhauer Science Officer GWSP, Hassan Virji Director International START Secretariat, Harold Mooney, Chair, SC-DIVERSITAS, Mark Rosenberg, Co-Chair, GECHH See Annex 1 for Participant List with contact details.

3 Summary Report, v.1 4 th ESSP SC Meeting, Bonn, 2010 Table of Content SUMMARY Report and Minutes... 1 Participants... 1 Present... 1 Invited Participants... 1 Apologies... 1 Action Points... 1 Opening Session... 2 ESSP update... 4 New Science and Insights... 5 An International Programme of Biodiveristy Science (DIVERSITAS)... 5 International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme (IGBP)... 5 International Human Dimensions Programme on Global Environmental Change (IHDP)... 6 World Climate Research Programme (WCRP)... 7 New Science Insights, Policy Impacts and Collaborative Opportunities... 8 Global Carbon Project (GCP)... 8 Monsoon Asia Integrated Regional Study (MAIRS)... 8 Global Water System Project (GWSP)... 9 Global Environmental Change and Human Health (GECHH)... 9 Capacity building Strategic Positioning and Science Impact Visioning Belmont challenge Open Sciences Conference CGIAR Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security Global Environmental Change and Food Systems (GECAFS) and post United Nation University Institute for Water, Environment and Health (UNU- INWEH) Phase II of Global Carbon Project and International Carbon Office Phase II International Carbon Office (ICO) Communication strategies Global Media Forum... 22

4 Summary Report, v.1 4 th ESSP SC Meeting, Bonn, 2010 Debategraph Other issues Solving Global Challenges Next ESSP SC meeting Closing Remarks Visioning part II ANNEX 1: participant list ICSU Appointed Members ICSU DIVERSITAS IGBP IHDP WCRP Global Carbon Project (GCP) GEC and Food Systems (GECAFS) Global Water System Project (GWSP) Global Environmental Change and Human Health (GECHH) Global Change SysTem for Analysis, Research, and Training (START) Monsoon Asia Integrated Regional Study (MAIRS) Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) ESSP INVITED GUESTS ANNEX 2: agenda ANNEX 3 Acronyms Note: Meeting documents can be downloaded from the ESSP website ( username (essp-sc), password (Bonn2010).

5 Action Points Action 1: Rik Leemans and Joe Alcamo to further discuss and then arrange ESSP tele-con. Action 2: All to send to the ESSP the nominations for experts and reviewers for GEO5. Action 3: ESSP to follow-up with Rocio. In close cooperation with Programmes and Projects prepare for SBSTA. Action 4: To sent comments to Johan and Leah ASAP Action 5: ESSP SC members to send recommendations to IGBP for the OSC Chair and Scientific Organizing Committee composition, including who will represent their programmes on the SOC. The final SOC composition, including OSC Chair, will be agreed upon by the 4 GEC programmes and their ESSP. Action 6: ESSP high-level delegation to visit new CGIAR consortium board to explain that ESSP will bring considerable resources to the initiative (if not funds, then human resources working on the topic)? Action 7: Clarify and agree what ESSP can contribute to CCAFS before the Nairobi meeting. Action 8: Programmes SC representatives should be at the GECAFS SAC meeting in October 2010 Action 9: Diana and John to prepare a proposal on post 2011 GECAFS to be ready before the next GECAFS SAC meeting. Action 10: to work together, ESSP and UNU-INWEH, on the international water Scientific learning network. Action 11: Martin Rice is to further explore the potential of this web-based tool to garner public understanding of and support for global environmental change research. 1 ESSP SC Meeting 2010 Draft Summary Report

6 Opening Session Rik Leemans, Chair of ESSP SC, thanked the local hosts - IHDP, welcomed participants and ran through the agenda (see Annex 2), which was adopted. He apologized for the participants that could not arrive to Bonn, due to the disturbed air traffic caused by the volcano eruption in Iceland. ESSP SC members not able to attend were invited to participate via tele-con. Actions on action points from the last meeting: 1. Rik Leemans thanked to Adeel Zafar for UNU-INWEH hosting the IPO of Global Environmental Change and Human Health (GECHH). GECHH IPO, which was launched in January AfricanNESS has lost its interim chair last year. There will be changes at ICSU regional offices. ICSU Regional Office for Africa is currently conducting interviws for a new Director. There is still interest from National Science Foundation (USA) to bring AfricanNESS and ICSU groups together to move things forward. Funds to get for capacity building: (1) Carlos Nobre: IGBP encouraged African scientists to apply for funds for UK ecosystem services and poverty alleviation. 3. Ghassem Asrar ran through WCRP Joint Scientific Committee discussions concerning capacity building via WCRP focusing on Asia and Africa as presented by the International START Secretariat Director, Hassan Virji at the recent WCRP JSC Meeting. 4. We are invited, this year, to attend the Tallberg Forum. An outcome of last year s coconvened Forum and workshops at the Tallberg Forum with the ESSP and Stockholm Resilience Centre was a paper on planetary boundaries published in Nature in September There is still no clear path developed for the ESSP/UNEP collaboration. At the Climate Adaptation Futures Conference in Australia (29 June 1 July 2010), UNEP will launch a new adaptation programme. UNEP has invited ESSP to manage a review of the Global Environmental Outlook-5. Rik had a short talk with Joe Alcamo, but we need to learn more. Sybil Seitzinger envisaged a range of potential scope for collaboration that should be developed in concert with the ESSP parent programmes. ESSP should look at broader UNEP landscape; among the UNEP 6 priority areas. Action 1: Rik Leemans and Joe Alcamo to further discuss and then arrange ESSP telecon. Action 2: All to send to the ESSP the nominations for experts and reviewers for GEO5. ESSP and the Programmes are invited again to present at UNFCCC SBSTA 32. The form might change this year. It will, most probably, focus on specific issues. Ghassem pointed out that it is important to know what they want to tackle. We need an expert to present. Deliang mentioned that ICSU started disaster risk program. CBD sits on DIV SC. Rik pointed out that UNFCCC set-up differs. He mentioned that one of the influential channels is via the assessment reports, though they are set up every 5-6 years. In 2008, WCRP specifically set up an afternoon event on NWP, where they listed the constituencies. The idea is to help availability of climate info at the regional level, with major focus on Africa. In response, WCRP developed CORDEX, an example of how the sciences can be communicated to policymakers. Anne pointed out that we need more input leading up to ESSP SC meeting in order to timely prepare 2 ESSP SC Meeting 2010 Draft Summary Report

7 and provide better input e.g. experts. Can we have someone here, ex-officio rep at ESSP SC meetings? Janos agreed that we should strengthen cooperation, and notice that we should not forget the UNFCD. Action 3: ESSP to follow-up with Rocio. In close cooperation with Programmes and Projects prepare for SBSTA. Rik introduced Xizhe Peng, new ICSU nominated SC member. He is a demographer. His main involvement is through IHDP portfolio. He worked in the areas of: pollution, urbanization, consumption and linkages to the carbon emissions. 3 ESSP SC Meeting 2010 Draft Summary Report

8 ESSP update Martin Rice provided an overview on the ESSP activities. ESSP published its strategy paper in the inaugural edition of the ESSP-GEC journal Current Opinions in Environmental Sustainability COSUST. COSUST covers 6 different environmental themes, providing ESSP and its partner s opportunities to synthesis their science findings and that of the global environmental change research community. The ESSP updated provided details of major ESSP fora, including the Tallberg Forum, IPCCrelated workshops and a land use conflicts session at the World Social Science Forum. The various timeframes of the ESSP Joint Projects were flagged, emphasizing that the Projects are at different stages from starting-up (GECHH), mid-term (GWSP) and synthesis stage (GECFAS) or planning for phase II (GCP). Based on major outcomes of last year s meeting, the purpose of the ESSP meeting was reiterated, i.e. (1) design integrative science, (2) Facilitate discussions on how best to present science, (3) Identify higher level messages (4) Ensure the vitality of the science base and (5) Enable science-policy interface. Note: the complete set of programme memos, project and regional activity reports can be downloaded from the ESSP website ( username (essp-sc), password (Bonn2010). Discussion points after the presentation Adeel Zafar commented on the visibility and branding of the ESSP. He is concerned whether we are not counterproductive with our efforts of establishing a new journal. It seems that Current Opinions in Environmental Sustainability (COSUST) has a similar targeted audience to another Elsevier journal on Sustainability Sciences. Rik Leemans responded that COSUST is a successful synthesis journal. Martin Rice responded to the visibility issue. He noticed that individual programmes have good developed visibility. The ESSP, however, needs to improve its branding. There is confusion about CCAFS/GECAFS. It is not only funding confusion, although that was expressed as well. In May 2010 at the CCAFS launch conference there will be a meeting organized which should address many of these issues, e.g. what is the role of the ESSP community. Xizhe requested some explanation on what is the role of ESSP in relation to the UNFCCC COPs (Copenhagen/Mexico) meetings. Rik explained that we are scientific programmes. We are not political organization, but we would like to be policy related. Corrine mention that we are good at communicating to policy makers but there is a niche to communicate to the public, maybe the ESSP should do this? 4 ESSP SC Meeting 2010 Draft Summary Report

9 New Science and Insights An International Programme of Biodiveristy Science (DIVERSITAS) Anne Larigauderie provided an overview of past and future activities of DIVERSITAS. DIVERSITAS has organized the second Open Science Conference: Biodiversity and society: understanding connections, adapting to change hold October 2009 in Cape Town, South Africa. It was a major event; good participation, good representation of different groups, good press. They will publish major outcomes in a special issue of COSUST. DIVERSITAS along with the UNEP-WCMC will release at CBD-SBSTTA 14 (Nairobi, May 2010) a synthesis of biodiversity scenarios for the 21st century for the Global Biodiversity Outlook 3 (GBO3) for the Convention on Biological Diversity. It summarizes the current knowledge on unacceptable risks for human well being, and managing, adapting to biodiversity and ecosystem changes and makes recommendations for future actions. DIVERSITAS worked on biodiversity targets after 2010 in the framework of CBD, after mission the targets for Substantial progress was made during in developing the implementation plan for a new global biodiversity observing system (GEO BON), to be released at CBD-SBSTTA 14 in May GEO BON represents the implementation of the biodiversity component of GEOSS, the Global Earth Observing System of Systems. DIVERSITAS has been leading the scientific community, since 2005, in efforts to establish an IPCC like mechanism for biodiversity, called Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES). The 3 rd and, in principle, final intergovernmental and multistakeholder negotiation will take place 7-11 June 2010 (Republic of Korea), for a possible launch later this year, during 2010, the International Year of Biodiversity. International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme (IGBP) Carlos Nobre presented an overview of IGBP activities. IGBP organized a meeting together with the IPCC and ESSP, in Brazil (November, 2009), on Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability (IAV) questions, especially in context of developing countries. One of the main objectives of this meeting was to ensure the central participation of developing country IAV communities in the IPCC fifth Assessment Report (AR-5). IGBP moves towards Earth Observations System and helps planning of GEOSS-IPCC. IGBP and WCRP are actively engaged in supporting planning for IPCC AR5 WGI and WGII climate and emissions scenarios work through IGBP AIMES; two of the IGBP Core Projects, Global Land Project and Land Ocean Interaction in the Coastal Zone) are jointly sponsored by IHDP. IGBP and WCRP combined their efforts in the integrated modeling in the AIMES project. This year AIMES will have its own Open Sciences Conference. Support to other policy relevant events: (i) IGAC contributed to Montreal protocol, (ii) IGBP contributed to World Climate Conference-3. Through a series of consultations with IPCC, ICSU and the global-change programmes, and others, IGBP has identified the areas in Earth system science most requiring synthesis. This work is relevant to the AR-5. The synthesis will be published in the peer-reviewed literature, inform policy and pinpoint the knowledge gaps for further exploration. Some of the synthesis themes of particular relevance to climate change are: nitrogen and climate; global nitrogen geoengineering impacts; global environmental change and sustainable development: the 5 ESSP SC Meeting 2010 Draft Summary Report

10 needs of least developed nations; megacities in the coastal zone; changing aerosols in the Earth system; air pollution and climate; Earth system impacts from changes in the cryosphere; the role of land cover and land use in modulating climate; and, acting on adaptation to global environmental change. Many of the synthesis themes, while building on IGBP science, will require a high degree of collaboration across natural and social scientists. In order to reach for broader communities IGBP has launched a climate index during the UNFCCC COP-15. The index brings together four of the most important Earth system parameters that humans are changing: temperature, carbon dioxide, sea-level rise and summer Arctic sea ice. It is a simple index including; CO2 concentration, ice melting, see level rise and global temperatures. Moreover, it has launched new Global Change magazine and started several pilot projects to wider the audience. Some work on Facebook is also envisaged. IGBP also plans to write its own statement showing its support to the IPCC. It acknowledges that the IPCC report is a robust process, not infallible but the media reporting of some errors does not undermine major conclusions of IPCC. International Human Dimensions Programme on Global Environmental Change (IHDP) Oran Young presented the IHDP update. In January 2010 a new director was appointed: Anantha Duraiappah. He is an environmental/development economist, specializing in ecosystem services. Anantha Duraiappah and Falk Schmidt expanded on current activities; starting on IHDP events at the UNFCCC COP-15 in Copenhagen. IHDP will continue to work on population studies, equity, development, population-environment interactions, technological innovation and governance. In 2010 open sciences conference of joint projects, UGC and GLP, will convene. Two core IHDP projects are currently in their synthesis phase; IHDP-IT and GECHS present their 10 year synthesis. Anantha Duraiappah mentioned new interesting project proposals on e.g. (1) fundamental social science, knowledge, learning and societal change (KLSE) that deal with integration of knowledge, traditional and western and look at how it does or does not get translated into knowledge); (2) millennium assessment on human behavior; (3) value of environmental services (cultural identity); (4) equity and poverty. Concerning the last project he would like the IHDP to move beyond 1 dollar a day definition. These new projects should be more policy relevant and contribute to the visioning process. Oran Young presented his vision on the science insights. It goes beyond current understanding of social sciences. He pointed out that human behavior often diverges dramatically. People face not only environmental global change but they are exposed to possibly even stronger changes like e.g. globalization. He posed a question whether we are able to generate knowledge, thresholds and tipping points (double exposure) to all of these changes. Do we have an institutional background to tackle these problems? Currently multilateral agreements are important but there is much more to governance that that. We need to look at architecture, non stature, e.g. forest/marine stewardship council, and to cast the need wider to look at architecture. For instance the valuation of ecosystem services is often only a poor index. This can change and this is where e.g. a grant from the Packard Foundation can play a role. Ghassem Asrar expressed his interest in the Packard project and hope that we can learn from the process of IHDP: does the proposal go beyond the IHDP, reaching the broader social sciences community? 6 ESSP SC Meeting 2010 Draft Summary Report

11 Anantha Duraiappah confirmed that, Packard process is broader than IHDP; including the ISSC. It should answer the question on what the expectations are from social sciences including natural scientists and policy makers. An inclusive survey will be done. This process is supposed to last till the end of 2010, too long to be included in the Visioning process. Comments from Deliang were made on the involvement of the natural scientists in this process. Both Oran Young and Rik Leemans agree about the need to be involved in the dialog with policy makers. As a Partnership, we should learn from each other, take experience (current and planning for new). World Climate Research Programme (WCRP) Ghassem Asrar presented highlights from the WCRP. He started with a brief history of the programme. WCRP was established as a result of first World Climate Conferences (WCC) in 1979, in order to provide insights on how the climate function does and what is the role of humans. 10 years later, we need to get that knowledge to policy-makers and to wider audience. WCRP is involved in 4 major projects: 1) coordination of global research, 2) role of oceans in climate systems, 3) role of ice in the global climate system, 4) chemistry of the atmosphere. Each of the project support different assessment. There was an independent review of the programme and in this review there were recommendation for i) communication on adaptation and risk management and identification of cross cutting themes, ii) directions for the WCRP programme and 3) and on how to organize the WCRP community to be responsive and accommodate the needs of the users. Major WCRP events the past year include: (1) World Climate Confrence 3, which led to the establishment of a Global Framework for Climate Services, (2) The OceanObs'09 Conference determined a common vision for the provision of routine and sustained global information on the marine environment sufficient to meet society s needs for describing, understanding and forecasting marine variability (including physical, biogeochemical, ecosystems and living marine resources), weather, seasonal to decadal climate variability, climate change, sustainable management of living marine resources, and assessment of longer term trends.(3) ICSU Visioning. Capacity building within WCRP is focused mainly on Africa; creating protocols and standards for scientific research in developing world. It is useful in creating observation network in currently poor organized structure. Another capacity oriented project is the Cities at Risks ; a partnerships with START and ICSU. 7 ESSP SC Meeting 2010 Draft Summary Report

12 New Science Insights, Policy Impacts and Collaborative Opportunities Global Carbon Project (GCP) Corinne Le Quéré presented the Global Carbon Project update. Two major scientific findings resulted from the 2008 GCP are confirmed in the last Global Carbon Budget (2009); (i) the efficiency of the natural sinks to remove carbon dioxide is likely declining, though this result has high uncertainty, and (ii) current fossil fuel CO 2 emission trajectory is at the top end of the SRES emission scenarios. You can find more information at: Corinne indicated that some estimates used in previous GCP can be improved. For instance, the emissions coming from the land use change are not satisfactory. Several land use models are trying to tackle this problem, but more research is needed. Some of these issues are going to be tackled in Phase II. From recent model results and ocean repeated observations, it is apparent that the carbon sinks are not following the emissions, though this is controversial and more work needs to be done to increase the confidence in these results; Phase II will continue the research on this topic. GCP will continue to cooperate with WCRP on the variability of the CO 2 sinks and it is planning to increase the cooperation with the IHDP on the socio-economic aspects of GHG emissions. GCP is very successful with publishing its results; both in the scientific papers and for the wider community. Synthesis of results of the first phase of GCP will be published in a special issue of COSUST. Moreover, a special UNESCO/SCOPE briefing paper was prepared for the Copenhagen meeting (COP). The details of the 2 nd Phase will be discussed later. Monsoon Asia Integrated Regional Study (MAIRS) MAIRS is a regional programme of the ESSP. The MAIRS update was presented by Ailikun, Director of MAIRS. MAIRS has focused on three key research areas; namely (1) dryland study, (2) mega-cities, (3) regional earth system modeling. There are two groups established to work on the Dryland study project: (i) observation and Land-Atmosphere Interaction, and (ii) Coupled Human- Environment System (CHE). An observation network on atmosphere-soil-ecosystem was established 3 years ago and there are plans to expand it. The regional Earth system modeling is comprised of three modeling groups: (i) Regional climate modeling group, (ii) Land surface modeling group and (iii) Ecosystem modeling group. Questions from ESSP SC members: Is it an integrated modeling exercise? Ailikun responded that most of the models cover natural processes and only some inputs are necessary from the socio-economic agenda. Anand Patwardhan noticed that most of the economic models use climate as an external input, it would be good to have an integrated climate-economic models where all (most) interactions would be taken into account. Oran Young said that this goes beyond MAIRS programme specifically. The Visioning Process will hopefully include some work on the integrated modeling as well. 8 ESSP SC Meeting 2010 Draft Summary Report

13 Global Water System Project (GWSP) The Global Water System Project, presented by Charles Vörösmarty, is on track again after some perturbation with finance of the IPO. The host institution IPO is ZEF in Bonn. A new Executive Officer (Janos Bogardi) started on 1 June GWSP continues its work on the three Global Initiatives. These initiatives are targeted towards the production of scientifically cutting-edge and highly policy-relevant results. The three Global Initiatives are: (1) Global Scale Initiative: Ranking of Threats to the Global Water System, (2) Global Catchment Initiative: Bringing the Global Perspective to River Basin Research and Management, and (3) Global Water Needs: Humans and Nature. Main highlights; it is not only climate change that has an impact on water, but also water has an impact on climate. The analysis of the global water shortages shown that this problem affects not only the poor countries, but also Europe and some areas of the US have potentially too little water resources. One of its recent studies shows that with regards to changing climate, on a global level there will be little shift of the mean annual renewable water resources, however, the temporal and spatial variability will increase. On the regional level, these changes are more evident; there is a strong agreement on (i) increasing runoff in Asia and Polar region and (ii) decreasing runoff in Latin America and Australia-Oceania. Additionally, GWSP in partnership with DIVERSITAS, focused on water needs for humans and nature. The results indicate that the water shortage problem might grow over the years across many regions. GWSP organized the main science event of the World Water Day (Nairobi, 22 March, 2010): (Panel Discussion on Water Quality) and developed Nairobi Scientific Communiqué on Water Quality Challenges and Responses. Major Activities for Science Agenda Development ( ) include: (i) Workshops and Conferences of the three Integrated Study Areas (ISA) in 2010, (ii) Major science conference in September 2011, (iii) Reviewing and restructuring of the Digital Water Atlas. Moreover there will be extensive work on the subject of the role of water systems in climate change mitigation, The role of water in human migration is a new study area. The water and health nexus will be addressed in cooperation with GECHH. Global Environmental Change and Human Health (GECHH) The new GECHH Project Officer Lucilla Spini presented an update on the establishment of the GECHH International Project Office (IPO), the operationalization of the Science Plan and an overview of the upcoming activities planned for the next 2-3 years. In particular, she highlighted that the GECHH IPO is hosted as well as supported by the United Nations University Institute for Water, Environment and Health (UNU-INWEH) in Hamilton, Canada: both the financial and in-kind support by UNU-INWEH to the GECHH IPO were acknowledged. Furthermore, the Agreement of Cooperation between ESSP and UNU- INWEH was reported as an opportunity for strengthening the ESSP/UNU linkages. In recalling the overall goals of the Project, the medium-term objectives identified for were presented and included: (i) To consolidate interactions w/other GEC JPs; (ii) To have at least 20 projects & 10 research groups within GECHH; (iii) To present scientific products to the end users of the research; (iv) To build capacity on GEC/HH nexus; and (v) To enhance GECHH awareness, recognition and self-sustainability. Within this framework, upcoming activities were reported including the upcoming IHDP UPDATE Magazine on Global Change and Human Health, as well as the GECHH 2010 Annual Symposium Global Environmental Change and Human Health: Protecting Water Quality, to be organized in partnership with UNU-INWEH (Hamilton, Canada, 1-2 November 2010), back-to-back with 9 ESSP SC Meeting 2010 Draft Summary Report

14 the 3 rd Meeting of the GECHH SSC (Hamilton, Canada, 3-4 November 2010). Linkages and synergies with the GWSP Joint Project were underlined. Reference was also made to the GECHH 2011 Symposium on Global Environmental Change and Human Health: Protecting Food Security and the GECHH 2012 Symposium Global Environmental Change and Human Health: Protecting Ecosystem Services. Guidance was then requested from the ESSP SC to further linkages with other ESSP JPs so as to work together in addressing those stresses on freshwater, food-producing systems, and climate regulation causing major adverse health impacts. Lucilla Spini concluded by acknowledging the role and contributions of the GEC parent programmes, the ESSP Coordination Office and the UNU-INWEH, towards GECHH. Comments on the presentation and strategic plan of GECHH. Adeel emphasised the important linkages between GECHH and UNU-INWEH and highlighted that UNU-INWEH is facilitating linkages with other relevant institutions such as the International Development Research Centre (IDRC). Janos Bogardi welcomed the presentation and highlighted the linkages between GECHH, UNU-INWEH and the GWSP, especially with respect to the upcoming symposium. Oran Young, highlighting previous concerns by IHDP with respect to the Project, congratulated the GECHH for the presentation and progress made and emphasised the strong linkages with the other Joint Projects. Comments were made on the importance of including the human dimension within the Symposium as well as on the opportunities and synergies that the Symposium can provide. In particular, Anantha stressed the importance of the policy implications within GECHH and suggested the inclusions of the human health impact on GDP as an issue to be considered within the Symposium. In this context, Lucilla informed that she will be sharing the concept note of the Symposium among the ESSP SC members in due course. Xizhe noticed that IDRC can be as an important partner due to its focus on EcoHealth. Lucilla highlighted that the GECHH is currently establishing linkages with IDRC and considering strengthening linkages with WHO to address public health systems. The importance of regional approaches within GECHH was also underlined. Clarifications were made concerning the medium term objective no (ii) To have at least 20 projects... by highlighting that GECHH is referring to current projects to be endorsed, by the GECHH, as done for instance within the GWSP. Rik stated that this approach can be successful. Capacity building Due to travel chaos caused by the Volcano, this session did not go to plan. START did, however, provide briefing papers for the meeting and Ghassem Asrar briefly presented key aspects of the briefing papers, which drew upon START s presentation at the WCRP JSC meeting in February ESSP SC Meeting 2010 Draft Summary Report

15 Strategic Positioning and Science Impact Deliang Chen presented the ICSU visioning and Belmont forum. Visioning Note that the title has changed from Visioning of Earth Systems Sciences to Visioning of Sustainability Research. This change was made to accommodate the visibility of social science and the humanities. Anand Patwardhan noticed that the sustainability of an environmental issue, framing of a grand scientific challenge, makes our efforts narrower. Oran Young agreed. He said that the language of 5 challenges does not fully reflect what was said in the first visioning meeting in Paris. Issues such as MDGs, poverty and health, globalization were on the agenda, but are hardly represented in the Challenges. Sustainability challenge includes social, economic and cultural, as well as environmental issues. In Paris, the discussion was broader, more integrative, and had multiple dimensions of sustainable development. Issues that are lacking in current Grand Challenges are e.g. forecast of future, economic, social, health considerations and their interactions. Rik Leemans noticed that these challenges are not always clear, i.e. Challenge 3 (Determine how to anticipate, avoid and cope with dangerous global environmental change) and Challenge 5 (Develop and evaluate innovative technological and social responses to achieve global sustainability). Janos Bogardi emphasized that the new title and 5 challenges mismatch. The three first ones are on the environmental change and the last two relate to global sustainability. Deliang Chen responded to the above mentioned questions and concerns. There is still some time for change. The task group can handle these changes when they would meet in Stockholm this weekend ( ). Anand Patwardhan noticed that we are dealing with a positive and normative issue (e.g. research for sustainability, how this is constructed, what s the underlying basis for this, i.e. meant to advance research with strong normative values). Jerry Melillo stated that these challenges do not sound terribly exciting. If we are to communicate excitement to funders and public, these are deadly. It needs an appendium piece to jazz it up. Diana Liverman added that communication to stakeholders needs to be included. She agreed with Jerry that it needs to sound more exciting. Anand Patwardhan posed a question whether the global sustainability research (new programme) will be taking over the GEC programmes. Deliang has responded that this depends on the outcome of the visioning and the bottom line is that it has to be built on the network, experiences and capability of the existing programmes. Moreover, he pointed out that it is not the interest of ICSU to organize anything that is not in line with what scientists believe. Action 4: To sent comments to Johan and Leah ASAP Anantha pointed out that the Visioning is a major undertaking trying to re-organize the landscape within the next 10 years. He indicated that the response rate of 81 might have been too low for determining such a major initiative. Perhaps the outreach has been poor. What s the matrix for evaluating progress? Visioning process need to engage with this community. The new sciences should be of policy relevance, and in line with other policy relevant 11 ESSP SC Meeting 2010 Draft Summary Report

16 institutions e.g. World Bank. There is an issue of transparency; e.g. does ICSU have a record of all the comments and on the questioner. Deliang Chen responded that the first reactions included over 8000 unique entries. Measure of success and sustainability; established task team has discussed this. It should be included in the last version of draft report. It would be a good idea to address each input, but ICSU resources do not allow for this. All comments have been kept in ICSU. Jerry Melillo pointed out that we are dealing with volunteer organizations; to restructure it might be a difficult task. We might lose enthusiasm and interest of the volunteers. If this structure is in transition then we might lose players. How do we handle this? It might be just too costly to us to start any new organization. The uncertainty of the visioning process is causing is a great concern; many might lose interest in GEC programmes. Deliang Chen responded that indeed we need to be careful. Each of us should keep in mind this is a bottom up process. We are open for input from scientific community. Oran Young added that ICSU might not have enough resources plus there are other constraints. It might get caught in a process with no clear outcome, which could be costly to the programmes. It is a challenge to find a way to avoid this. Belmont challenge Independent, although not in isolation of the Visioning challenges, the Belmont Forum came up with 5 priority areas: costal zones, water cycle, carbon cycle, ecosystem services and most vulnerable societies. Jerry Melillo emphasized that these outputs are not exciting as well. We need to craft more exciting work. Rik Leemans noticed that, in contracts to Visioning, Belmont has focused on product oriented environmental changes. We need the integrative sciences. We shall need to look at other funding mechanisms. Anantha Duraiappah envisaged the danger in too western focus on solving problems. It is not acceptable to not change the way we work. He sees no fair representation of the science (not talking about programmes). Janos Bogardi agreed. We do not operate the same language and we misinterpret different words; e.g. sustainability science is defined by Japanese and we think of it in a different form than they do. Anand Patwardhan added that according to him the Belmont challenge connects science with the implementation action agenda. However he sees a danger in going too quickly into action instead of seeing its distinctness. It sounds good but there is a legitimate need to address the areas to build basic understanding of phenomena of interest. There is too little involvement of the developing world. He is not so sure what the geographical cross-cutting is for the ICSU visioning. It is interesting to see the difference between processes that is inherently bottom-up and top-down with consultation. Rik Leemans noted that it is important to have Visioning and Belmont discussions. Visioning has embraced all, e.g. skeptics, students, policy makers; and this is good. When we look at ESSP mission strategy; study of earth as an integrated system; we tend to focus on how and why it is changing but not on its management. Visioning has made a strong step in this direction. We need to connect science to action agenda. The question remains on how to manage the system? Some of the last challenges do focus on this in the visioning. We need a new set of tools, but not necessarily super computers. Within ESSP partnership we have to harvest experience, we cannot remain within status quo. Integrative science can be enhanced. One of the possible ways can lead via the integrated modeling, though not 12 ESSP SC Meeting 2010 Draft Summary Report

17 everyone believes this. We need a broad community. Many other issues remain e.g. how to organize the community, plethora of acronyms, issue of marketing or re-organizations. Oran Young added that the potential for fundamental changes lay in the way the programmes are organized and funded. Openness to exploration is good, but one needs to be careful that this process will not create chaos and confusion. He acknowledged that it is good to have this discussion, and that we cannot be stuck in Business as Usual. Carlos Nobre pointed out that we are going round in circles. According to him it is necessary in such processes. Integrated ESSP/Sustainability research is not advancing as much as it could. So far the process is a bottom up process and it let us think on how to organize ourselves. He stressed that we can and we should contribute to the new structure. Rik Leemans noted that maybe we shall look closer at our successful projects that have great integrative experience and learn from this integration e.g. LOICZ. Oran Young agreed with this point; it is a great opportunity and we can learn from own experiences. He stressed that ESSP SC conversation is important in facilitating such projects. Ghassem Asrar took time to reflect. The type of analysis and synthesis being done today is remarkable. We should have plan for the next 20 years, it generates excitement within community. We should define what is it we want to do and then organize ourself accordingly. Sometime we focus too much on how rather than what. He emphasized that we should point out the exciting, integrative science and that the community will form itself. One thing we need to do is to generate the next generation of leaders to take this forward; the integrative scientists, natural and social scientists that can do the future job. We cannot tackle big ticket items without putting in place a sustained set of capacity building and training for the next generation of leaders. Rik Leemans responded that it is difficult to find leaders. Some are coming through. Deliang Chen agreed with Ghassem. We need more champions, and we need to train them. 13 ESSP SC Meeting 2010 Draft Summary Report

18 Open Sciences Conference Update on Programme Open Sciences Conferences: DIVERSITAS: planning to hold an OSC in 2014 IGBP: global change OSC 2012 in London IHDP: No clear plans, yet, regarding date of future OSC WCRP: OSC in Denver, USA, October The first WCRP OSC took place well over 10 years ago. It coincides with the 30 th anniversary of the programme. The WCRP OSC will assess our current state of knowledge on climate variability and change, identify the most urgent scientific issues and research challenges, and ascertain how the WCRP can best facilitate research and develop partnerships critical for progress. The OSC will facilitate cross-fertilization across the diverse research communities within the WCRP, as well as with partner research programmes and the ESSP. The ESSP has no OSC plans. Martin Rice stressed that there is a clear need for greater coordination and planning of future OSCs. Advance warning needs to be given to funding agencies (be aware of funding fatigue). Joint Programme/Project OSCs seem to be very effective Global Change Presentation Sybil Seitzinger IGBP is planning to convene a Global Change Conference in London in 7 10 May 2012, Planet Under Pressure: New Knowledge Towards Solutions. This Global Change OSC will take account of ICSU Visioning, Belmont Challenge and the UN Earth Summit 2012, and engage wide range of natural and social scientists, policy makers, leaders from private sector, technologists, engineers, etc. Although initiated by IGBP, the hope is that all 4 Programmes and ESSP will be equally involved. A suggestion for how to frame the conference could be through the following questions in relation to global change: What do we know? What do we need to know? What does this mean for the future of society? What do we need to do? And, how long have we got to do it? As a next step, IGBP seeks urgent recommendations from the partner research programmes and the ESSP concerning Selection of OSC Chair and Scientific Committee. Comments from UK organizer, John Ingram: It is important that this Conference attracts worldwide community of GEC science, policy, natural resources management, business and so on. This would also be good from a marketing perspective. Earth system perspectives and Rio +20 are also important. Comments from ESSP SC members: IHDP: Compared development of 2001 Amsterdam OSC where the process broadened late in the day. It was a strange hybrid event. Good but not good enough. Getting collaborative agreements on 2012 OSC at this stage is far better as it is still early enough to broaden the meeting to a full Global Change event. Receptive to amalgamate activities and not have numerous OSCs. Previous plans of having an OSC together with IGBP have not been pursued. If the 2012 Conference is to be an IGBP one then it will be difficult to attract the social science 14 ESSP SC Meeting 2010 Draft Summary Report

19 community. IHDP is, however, willing to participate and the Conference might be a good venue to take account for the ICSU visioning. DIVERSITAS: shares similar view with IHDP. GWSP: GWSP was going to have an OSC but not sure now. The Project would consider being involved in an omnibus. ICSU: In its current form it cannot be viewed as ESSP conference. ICSU strongly encourages involving partners at an early stage to develop a common strategy for the meeting. ESSP, Rik Leemans: (In response to the question of whether this should become an ESSP conference) IGBP initiated the OSC and at this point it cannot be claimed by other programmes. It should remain an IGBP initiated conference. People from the programmes should be on the organizing committee and send ideas on the chair of the organizing committee. Diana Liverman: The Conference could be branded towards the respective Programmes communities; e.g. by IHDP as This is an OSC at which IHDP results can be effectively presented to the broad GEC community, and similarly for the other 3 Programmes. ESSP SC Decision: The OSC Conference in 2012 is a Global Change conference with strong participation from all the partner research programmes and the ESSP. IGBP will take the lead but with full participation from the partners in developing a common strategy for the meeting. Action 5: ESSP SC members to send recommendations to IGBP for the OSC Chair and Scientific Organizing Committee composition, including who will represent their programmes on the SOC. The final SOC composition, including OSC Chair, will be agreed upon by the 4 GEC programmes and their ESSP. 15 ESSP SC Meeting 2010 Draft Summary Report

20 CGIAR Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security Presented by Bruce Campbell, Chair of CCAFS (via Skype). The CGIAR Challenge Program "Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security" was designed as a major collaborative endeavor between the Alliance of the Consultative Group on International Agriculture Research (CGIAR) Centers and the ESSP. However, the CGIAR is going through major changes, and all Challenge Programs such as CCAFS are being restructured within the emerging 7 mega programs (MP). CCAFS is positioned to potentially lead MP7 which is on climate change, agriculture and food security (the acronym CCAFS will still be used for the time being). But this restructuring will bring changes in the role that ESSP will be playing within MP. Proposed objectives of the MP are: (1) to provide diagnosis and analysis to ensure the inclusion of agriculture, livestock and fisheries in climate change policies, and (2) to identify and develop pro-poor adaptation and mitigation practices, technologies and policies for food systems and rural livelihoods. Original CCAFS concept is similar to the new proposed concept. The ESSP SC discussed how we can best contribute / provide support to CCAFS activities, including launch conference and thematic research, fund raising and GEC community-wide buy-in. It was agreed that a high-level ESSP delegation should visit the CGIAR consortium board to explain what ESSP brings to the MP. Charles Vörösmarty re-iterated the need to include feed-backs to the Earth System (e.g. inadvertent consequences of actions with regards to climate mitigation) and especially regarding trade-offs with other goals. Janos Bogardi expressed his concern that it seems that the idea of being a co-sponsor turned out into being a special-partner. Bruce replied that indeed the way of participation is not very clear now. John Ingram pointed out that CGIAR is a very large enterprise but the Challenge Program was unique in having a collaborative vision, and we are lucky that we have this history of integrated sciences to take forward as the MP emerges. John supports needs for high level ESSP delegation to CGIAR consortium board to explain what we offer (it can be difficult for CGIAR to understand ESSP, due to its completely different culture, so we must explain this clearly). It is of paramount importance to keep GEC science relevance in this mega program, it would be a tragedy if the MP reverts to a sole-cgiar agenda. Action 6: ESSP high-level delegation to visit new CGIAR consortium board to explain that ESSP will bring considerable resources to the initiative (if not funds, then human resources working on the topic)? Diana Liverman confirmed that we should get more visibility in the process. She highlighted a need for more official ways of doing it e.g. sending a letter from the heads of the ESSP. Rik added that maybe we should talk to them first to know what they need from us. Bruce mentioned that there is a new board chair Carlos Pérez del Castillo from Uruguay who is positive about our GEC community. John Ingram stressed that we need to be overly proactive. Ghassem Asrar agreed but pointed out that approaching any of the national climate centers is complex and requires time. We should focus on finding entries to the research related organizations rather than the operational met services. Diana Liverman stressed the importance of a coherent message that at the beginning of CCAFS launch meeting warranting meeting/telephone call linking ESSP people who will be participating. She stressed that 16 ESSP SC Meeting 2010 Draft Summary Report

21 GECAFS is not going to phase II so CCAFS can be important project as a follow up of GECAFS work. Action 7: Clarify and agree what ESSP can contribute to CCAFS before the Nairobi meeting. 17 ESSP SC Meeting 2010 Draft Summary Report

22 Global Environmental Change and Food Systems (GECAFS) and post 2011 John Ingram presented the updates on the GECAFS project and there was a discussion on the post 2011 era of the food systems. John announced Food Security and Environmental Change: linking science, development and policy for adaptation Special Issue of Environmental Science and Policy, 2009, Vol. 12(4), an output from Oxford Conference (April 2008). Moreover the GECAFS synthesis Food security and global environmental change is nearing completion. While the synthesis draws heavily on GECAFS it is an effort of, and synthesizes information from, the broader GEC and food security community. It is divided into 5 sections: (1) Food security and global environmental change, (2) Vulnerability, resilience and adaptation in food systems, (3) Engaging stakeholders, (4) A regional approach Section, and (5) Food systems in a changing world. Additionally, the Policy Brief is to be published in the SCOPE/UNEP/UNESCO SPB Series, and a summary paper in COSUST. GECAFS ends March After the presentation there was a discussion on the future of food research in ESSP. The main question of the discussion was whether the ESSP need a food focused project after GECAFS closes? John Ingram stated that it is important to keep food security related issues high on the agenda. Oran Young agreed; there is a need to address food security/gec issues, compatible with grand challenges. He was not sure what organizational mechanism should be applied to it. Sybil Seitzinger agreed as well. We should think on how within the partner programmes we could accommodate the food system. Indeed it is consistent with ICSU visioning and IGBP vision. Oran stressed that we should not follow path dependent model, but rather we should think of how we want to work in the future. It means that we should not only extend the project, but we should think of mechanisms and vehicles for future projects. Diana Liverman mentioned that GECAFS SAC did not want a GECAFS II; there is a lot of spin-off but it would be good to have am ESSP JP on food and agriculture that was narrowly focused. We should find out if there is a gap that can be filled with other joint projects. Sybil thinks that CCAFS probably will take a part of the tasks. Anne Lariguaderie was not formally involved in GECAFS but sees some common ground in reconciling MDGs, biodiversity and food production. Rik Leemans pointed out that GECAFS was successful at putting food systems on the table and that the synthesis and book is a major milestone. Ghassem Asrar congratulated GECAFS but stressed that the future of such research in ESSP needs more thinking and urged Diana and John to submit a proposal to SC. He sees needs for clear guidelines and criteria for project development. Oran Young agrees that food should be on the agenda and urges that we should use this transition for defining new direction. Sybil Seitzinger added that projects should do more work with the programmes not as much focus on the integration within projects. Action 8: Programmes SC representatives should be at the GECAFS SAC meeting in October 2010 Action 9: Diana and John to prepare a proposal on post 2011 GECAFS to be ready before the next GECAFS SAC meeting. 18 ESSP SC Meeting 2010 Draft Summary Report