QUARTERLY NEWSLETTER — August 2019 Double Issue
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10th Anniversary Events Fast Approaching!
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On
October 21-22, 2019, Belmont Forum members, partners, past and present co-chairs, invited awardees, and special guests will be convening in Taipei for a special retrospective and visioning event held at NTNU.
These discussions will segue directly into the 10th anniversary plenary on
October 23-25, 2019. Documents to be discussed at the plenary should be submitted to the Secretariat no later than
September 3, 2019! We thank MOST for hosting this year's milestone events and look forward to seeing you in Taipei!
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Sustainability Research & Innovation 2020
Future Earth and the Belmont Forum, are joining forces to establish an annual marquis congress. This congress will allow the world’s foremost research and innovation communities to come together to share successes, exchange views, and work across disciplines and sectors to support a global transformation to sustainability.
Our first convening will bring together a global community of transdisciplinary research and innovation in an engaging, interactive format, allowing leaders in sustainability innovation to work alongside the world’s leading sustainability scientists, and to engage policy leaders working to support the major international policy processes supporting this transition.
Join us in Brisbane, Australia in June 14-17 2020!
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Steering Committee meeting in Brasilia
T
he Inter-American Institute (IAI) for Global Change Research welcomed the Belmont Forum Steering Committee (SC) members and Secretariat to Brasilia, Brazil for a mid-year SC meeting on 30-31 May 2019. The Ministry of Science, Technology, Innovation and Communication (MCTIC) hosted the meeting at the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq) Offices. The Steering Committee discussed the upcoming 10
th
Anniversary celebration and Plenary meeting, CRAs scoping workshops, plans for regional engagement workshops, Sustainability Research Innovation (SRI) 2020, and internal business including membership rotation. Immediately following the SC meeting, a 1-day scoping event of the Pathways to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) CRA was held in Brasilia on June 2
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, including members of the Science and Science Policy Committees of the IAI. These events led into the 27th meeting of the IAI Conference of the Parties, which was held on June 5-6
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Global Strategy and Planning
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May was a busy month for the Belmont Forum! We were happy to provide input to the new WCRP strategic plan, connect with The GEF International Waters and Large Marine Ecosystem project steering committees, contribute to the 1st Global Planning Meeting for the Decade of the Ocean, and attend the launch of the Global Risk Assessment Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction.
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Co-chair Maria Uhle and Executive Director Erica Key traveled to New Zealand to meet with ministries, Crown Research Institutes, and universities to learn more about their science and engagement priorities, partnership opportunities, and upcoming regional conferences.
Thanks to Bruce McCallum for organizing!
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Collaborative Research Actions (CRAs)
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Scenarios of Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services II Projects Kick-off meeting
From May 14-16, 2019, a Kick-off meeting of the Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services II (BES II) projects was held in Helsinki, Finland. BES II / Biodivscen is a joint program of the Belmont Forum and BiodivERsA, building off of capacity and network building activities in previous BES funding. This cohort of projects will promote innovative research for more informed decision-making by developing scenarios of biodiversity and ecosystem services, accounting for the complex interactions between socio-economic and global environmental trends. The meeting started with a half-day data management workshop aimed at exchanging best practices related to data management, presented hands-on advice developed so far, and worked with funded projects, on how they could improve their data management plans (DMPs) and practices related to open data.
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The Kick-off meeting was the occasion to get an overview of all projects funded through the joint Belmont Forum-BiodivERsA Call (BiodivScen Call) and for researchers to identify other projects with thematic or stakes similar to theirs, and to build potential clusters between BiodivScen projects. A Research and Innovation workshop was also tagged along the Kick-off meeting to support the development of scenarios of biodiversity and ecosystem services that are useful for and usable by private sector stakeholders. The workshop helped identify knowledge needs from businesses that will or could be addressed through BiodivScen research projects and spur new collaborations between involved researchers and business representative.
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Recognizing that SDGs have an international framework but that implementation will likely vary locally, the Pathways to the SDGs CRA scoping has taken a more regional approach. Over the past 2 years, the Belmont Forum has been connecting to experts, actors, and funders from different communities and continents about their goals for Agenda 2030. Following an event in Germany in February and then in Brasilia in June, the latest scoping took place at the
Evidence to Action Conference in Accra, Ghana on July 10-12, 2019.
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Scoping workshop: Sustainable Soil and Ground waters
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Over 20 participants from 7 countries met in Vienna, Austria on April 5-7, 2019 to discuss the development of the Sustainable Soil and Ground waters CRA.
This CRA aims at providing action-oriented knowledge to restore and/or improve resilience of the "critical zone" (CZ), the ecosystem that extends from vegetation to bedrock, through soils re-functionalization, and groundwater quality restoration. The first day of the workshop was an open session for discussion on the overall thematic context for this CRA, synergies and
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complementarity with other initiatives on similar themes. While the second day, was a closed session where funders discussed the research priorities and developed a CRA Action Plan. It is expected that the concept note for this CRA will be presented at the Belmont Forum Plenary in October 2019.
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Belmont Forum Tripartite Valorization Workshop
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The Belmont Forum Tripartite Valorization Synthesis Workshop was facilitated by the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science in Washington DC on 8-10 December 2018. It involved participants from the Food Security and Land Use Change, the Arctic Observing and Science for Sustainability and the Mountains as Sentinels of Change CRAs.
Representative from these project teams from around the globe met for the first time to share their results, progress, and common experiences.
Several common themes that address the challenges of climate change impacts on the ecosystems and human communities in the arctic, in mountains, and in food security emerged from the synthesis of the three Collaborative Research Action. These themes represent systems that are vulnerable to climate disruption and can serve as important models for a broad diversity of other coupled human and natural systems
Revealing real solutions for informed and deliberative decision making about sustainable resource use and development, the results provide further evidence that intense stakeholder engagement to co-develop locally based solutions is an approach that should be continued, expanded, and refined.
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Past and Upcoming Events
Belmont Forum is looking to connect with you!
Visit us at one of these events or follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn.
26-28 June
Transdisciplinary metrics and evaluation workshop
Alexandria, VA, United States
8-9 July
Science-driven e-Infrastructure Innovation (SEI) project kick-off meeting
Paris, France
9-10 July
London, UK
10-12 July
Accra, Ghana
28 July - August 2
Belmont Forum town hall meeting on 31 July from 12:30-2pm!
Singapore, Singapore
10-13 September
Gothenburg, Sweden
19-20 September
Beijing, China
25-26 September
High Level Officials Meeting, Regional Forum on Health and Environment
Manila, The Philippines
26-28 September
San Salvador, El Salvador
15-18 October
Santiago, Chile
21-22 October
Taipei, Chinese Taipei
23-25 October
Belmont Forum Plenary Meeting
Taipei, Chinese Taipei
11-15 November
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania
9-13 December
San Francisco, CA, USA
14-17 June, 2020
Brisbane, Australia
Due date for submission
3 September 2019
Plenary document deadline for members and partners
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ANNOUNCEMENTS
Welcoming Dr. Sylvie Roy of NSERC to the BF Secretariat
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During the Belmont Forum Plenary meeting in London on October 2018, Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC)’s membership was ratified. NSERC is seconding Dr. Sylvie Roy for one day a week to the Belmont Forum Secretariat to help advance member actions and meet the Belmont Forum Challenge.
Dr. Sylvie Roy joined the Natural Science and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) in Ottawa, Canada in 2009. She has a Ph.D. in Oceanography and has gained experience with international research collaboration through her work with the Canadian Surface Ocean Lower Atmosphere Study (C-SOLAS) secretariat at Dalhousie University (Canada) and her role as Executive Director for the International Project Office (IPO) of the Integrated Marine Biogeochemistry and Ecosystems Research (IMBER) in Brest (France). Her role and responsibilities with the Belmont Forum Secretariat include the development and implementation of activities such as valorization meetings and synthesis workshops; fostering communication with the project teams; designing outreach materials, and supporting cross-thematic synthesis and best practices among CRAs.
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