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Regional Committee Meeting in Mexico

On 1st and 2nd March 2011 the Regional Committee for ICSU Latin America and the Caribbean held their 9th meeting at the Mexican Academy of Sciences in Mexico City. The agenda included the identification of future actions and work priorities for the new office in Mexico after the relocation from Brazil, as well as strategies for the implementation of the four scientific priorities, sustainable energy, biodiversity, natural hazards, and mathematics education. Furthermore, the organization of the Regional Workshop for the Rio+20 Initiative was discussed and considered a work priority by the Regional Committee.
Regional Committee Meeting in Mexico

RCLAC9 meeting participants

Some details of the discussed agenda

  • Relocation of the office to Mexico
  • Future actions and work priorities
  • Regional Office 2010 Annual Report and Financial Summary
  • Progress report, follow up, and implementation of priority areas
  • Review of the Regional Office
  • Progress Report of ICSU global activities
  • Rio+20 regional meeting
  • ICSU Grant Program
  • Date and venue of next Regional Committee meeting

ICSU ROLAC future actions and work priorities

The Regional Committee decided on the following work priorities:

  1. The Regional Office should serve as the node for distribution of information from the ICSU headquarters to all ICSU members and to all regional contacts of ICSU’s scientific unions.
  2. A database of experts, including Research Centers and Academies, in Latin America and the Caribbean should be created. It should include the activities that take place in the region related to the ICSU ROLAC scientific areas of interest.
  3. The Regional Office will also coordinate the work of the Regional Committee members.  One of the first priorities is the Rio+20 process for Latin America and the Caribbean.

Rio+20 process for Latin America and the Caribbean

In June 2012, Rio de Janeiro will host the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development; 20 years after the city hosted the first such conference, the “Earth Summit”. This is an intergovernmental process with the main objective to renew political commitment to sustainable development and to address gaps and challenges. The ICSU Executive Board decided that ICSU should attach high priority to its participation in the Rio+20 process. In order to better be able to include the needs of our region, the schedule of preparatory meetings also includes a regional workshop for Latin America and the Caribbean, which will be organized in collaboration with UNESCO in August 2011. The Regional Committee decided to connect the preparation of Rio+20 to three of the four ICSU scientific priority areas: natural hazards, biodiversity and sustainable energy.

ICSU ROLAC scientific priority areas

The Regional Committee acknowledged the progress that ICSU ROLAC had made in implementing the science plans of the four scientific priority areas:

 1) Biodiversity: Two activities were stressed: 1) An online consultation in collaboration with DIVERSITAS, which resulted in the Policy Brief “Biodiversity and human well-being in Latin America and the Caribbean: A multi-sectoral contribution to the science-policy interface”, and 2) a meeting in Buenos Aires to discuss biodiversity databases in the region with the aim of a harmonization of protocols.

2) Natural hazards and disasters: Discussions with the Geological Union and with AGU are ongoing about the possibility of establishing an early warning system. ICSU just started a global programme on disasters, and potential avenues of collaboration should be explored.

3) Sustainable energy: The upcoming task is the establishment of an Interamerican Research Network on Sustainable Energy.

4) Mathematics education: A potential collaboration with the education department should be explored.

In order to better coordinate future tasks, two Regional Committee members were assigned to each priority area:

Biodiversity: Arturo Martinez (Argentina) and Mahabir Gupta (Panama)

Sustainable Energy: Elena Vigil (Cuba) and Tara Dasgupta (Jamaica)

Natural Hazards: Carmen Samayoa (Guatemala) and Arturo Martinez (Argentina)

Mathematics: Patricio Felmer (Chile) and José Antonio de la Peña (Mexico)

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