Future Earth

Future Earth is a new 10-year international research initiative that will develop the knowledge for responding effectively to the risks and opportunities of global environmental change and for supporting transformation towards global sustainability in the coming decades. Future Earth will mobilize thousands of scientists while strengthening partnerships with policy-makers and other stakeholders to provide sustainability options and solutions in the wake of Rio+20.

Nomination process for the Future Earth Science Committee is underway

The nomination process for the Future Earth Science Committee is underway. This committee will ensure that the science of Future Earth is of the highest quality, making recommendations on new and existing projects, and emerging priorities for research. It will oversee the transition of IGBP, IHDP and Diversitas activities into Future Earth, secure strong partnership with the WCRP community and provide guidance on new activities for Future Earth.

The Science Committee will comprise 16 members and two co-Chairs, representing the full spectrum of global environmental change science from natural science to social sciences, humanities and engineering, and may include scientists working in non-academic sectors, such as government and industry. It will include representation from the existing Global Environmental Change programmes.

The deadline for nominations was February 22nd.

Future Earth will be a global platform to deliver:

• Solution-orientated research for sustainability, linking environmental change and development challenges to satisfy human needs for food, water, energy, health;
• Effective interdisciplinary collaboration across natural and social sciences, humanities, economics, and technology development, to find the best scientific solutions to multi-faceted problems;
• Timely information for policy-makers by  generating the knowledge that will support existing and new global and regional integrated assessments;
• Participation of policy-makers, funders, academics, business and industry, and other sectors of civil society in co-designing and co-producing research agendas and knowledge;
• Increased capacity building in science, technology and innovation, especially in developing countries and engagement of a new generation of scientists.

Integrating existing endeavours

Future Earth will build on the success of existing global environmental change programmes (Diversitas, IGBP, IHDP, WCRP and ESSP), to help develop a stronger and broader community. The Planet Under Pressure conference (London, March 2012) was a step towards this goal, with wide support of Future Earth as one of its major outcomes.

Contact

Anne-Sophie Stevance, Science Officer at ICSU: anne-sophie.stevance@icsu.org.