A call for nominations to assist with the scoping of a methodological assessment of business and biodiversity for the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) is closing soon.

Interested experts wishing to be nominated by a Government are encouraged to contact their IPBES National Focal Point (https://www.ipbes.net/national-focal-points) regarding any country-specific processes or deadlines and are requested to fill out their application form by 25 January 2021. Nominators (Governments or organizations) should approve the applications and submit their nominations by 1 February 2021. Early nominations ahead of the deadline are encouraged.

This assessment is aimed at categorizing how businesses depend on, and impact, biodiversity and nature’s contributions to people and at identifying criteria and indicators for measuring that dependence and impact, taking into consideration how such metrics can be integrated into other aspects of sustainability. See the IPBES website to find out more.

All nominated experts (Nominees) need to be available to attend the scoping meeting that is part of the scoping process, tentatively scheduled for 26-30 April 2021.

Nominees are invited to fill out the application form and attach their curriculum vitae through the dedicated web portal at https://ipbes.net/application/scoping-of-a-methodological-assessment-of-business-and-biodiversity

An online conference to seek early input into the scoping process of the business and biodiversity assessment has been re-scheduled to 3 and 4 March 2021.

A survey to collect information on the use of completed IPBES assessments in policymaking at the national and subnational level is currently open for responses until 14 January 2021.

Governments and non-governmental stakeholders, including individuals, organizations, networks, researchers, and indigenous peoples and local communities are invited to take part in this survey and to  share information on how they have used completed IPBES assessments in their own work related to policymaking at the (sub)national level, by completing the questionnaire below.

You can access the survey here. Completing the survey will take approximately 15-20 minutes.

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Heading photo by Cédric VT on Unsplash

A call for applications for the 4th cohort of the Postdoc Academy for Transformational Leadership has now been released.

The Postdoc Academy for Transformational Leadership is a unique programme that develops the next generation of leaders in sustainability research affiliated with a European research institution. With this year’s focus topic “Pathways for regenerative development in human nature relationships. Building back better?”, the programme provides an intensive training with four seminars in two years that broaden the research competencies of early career researchers and promote their qualification towards transdisciplinary leadership. The programme also offers seed funding to groups of participants planning to initiate research collaborations. Furthermore, an active network of current and former participants of the programme will be established.

The programme is an initiative of the Robert Bosch Stiftung and a joint project of the Robert Bosch Stiftung and the four academic centres Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (IRI THESys), Leuphana University of Lüneburg, Stockholm Resilience Centre and The Dutch Research Institute for Transitions (DRIFT), Rotterdam.

For further information on the application process, please see here and refer to the Postdoc Academy Flyer_2021.

Applications can be submitted until 15^th February 2021.

Recent publications resulting from the T2S projects or from relevant research by members of the T2S community:

Articles and book chapters

Adger, W.N., Crépin, A.S., Folke, C., Ospina, D., Chapin III, F.S., Segerson, K., Seto, K.C., Anderies, J.M.,
Barrett, S., Bennett, E.M. Daily, G. etyt al., 2020. Urbanization, Migration, and Adaptation to Climate
Change. One Earth, 3(4), pp.396-399.

Bastiaensen Johan, Huybrechs Frédéric, Forcella Davide, Van Hecken Gert. 2020. Microfinance plus for ecosystem services : a territorial perspective on Proyecto CAMBio in Nicaragua, in: Value chain development and the poor : promise, delivery, and opportunities for impact at scale, Rugby,
Practical Action Publishing, p. 263-279.

Carr, Edward R. Resilient livelihoods in an era of global transformation. Global Environmental Change,
Volume 64, September 2020 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2020.102155

Chad S. Boda, Murray Scown, Turaj Faran, Maryam Nastar, Kelly Dorkenoo, Brian Chaffin & Emily Boyd,
2020. Framing Loss and Damage from climate change as the failure of Sustainable Development.
Climate and Development, https://doi.org/10.1080/17565529.2020.1851640

J. Calvimontes, L. Massaro, C.H.X. Araujo, R.R. Moraes, J. Mello, L.C. Ferreira, M. de Theije, Small-scale gold mining and the COVID-19 pandemic: Conflict and cooperation in the Brazilian Amazon, The Extractive Industries and Society, Volume 7, Issue 4, 2020, pp. 1347-1350, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.exis.2020.08.013.

Carton, W., Asiyanbi, A., Beck, S., Buck, H. & Lund, J. (2020). Negative emission and the long history of
carbon removal. Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change 11(6), e671.
https://doi.org/10.1002/wcc.671

Roberto Hernandez Chea, Akriti Jain, and Nancy Bocken, A Conceptualization of Firm Activities Toward Sustainability Transitions. Proceedings, 2020.

Hernández-Chea, R.; Vimalnath, P.; Bocken, N.; Tietze, F.; Eppinger, E. Integrating Intellectual Property and Sustainable Business Models: The SBM-IP Canvas. Sustainability 2020, 12, 8871.

Karpouzoglou T, Dewulf A, Perez K, Gurung P, Regmi S, Isaeva A, Foggin M, Bastiaensen J, Van Hecken G, Zulkafli Z, et al. 2020. From present to future development pathways in fragile mountain landscapes. Environmental Science & Policy, 114:606-613.

Jasanoff, S. (2020). Imagined worlds: The politics of future-making in the twenty-first century. In The
Politics and Science of Prevision (pp. 27-44). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003022428

Jasanoff, S. (2020). Knowing Earth. An Insider’s Guide to a Rapidly Changing Planet. In Tortell, P (Ed.).
Earth 2020: An Insider’s Guide to a Rapidly Changing Planet (pp. 169-176). Open Book Publisher.
https://doi.org/10.11647/obp.0193.19

Jasanoff, S. (2020). Pathologies of Liberty. Public Health Sovereignty and the Political Subject in the
Covid-19 Crisis. Cahiers Droit, Sciences & Technologies, (11), 125-149.
https://doi.org/10.4000/cdst.2982

Jasanoff, S. (2020). Ours Is the Earth: Science and Human History in the Anthropocene. Special issue of
the Journal of the Philosophy of History. 10.1163/18722636-12341447

Jolivet, D. “Welfare and Migration: Unfulfilled Aspirations to “Have Rights” in the South-Moroccan
Todgha Valley” IMI Working Paper Series, 170. November 2020.

Johnstone, P., Rogge, K. S., Kivimaa, P., Fratini, C. F., Primmer, E., & Stirling, A. (2020). Waves of
disruption in clean energy transitions: Sociotechnical dimensions of system disruption in Germany and
the United Kingdom. Energy Research & Social Science, 59, 101287.

Riedy, C. Discourse coalitions for sustainability transformations: common ground and conflict beyond neoliberalism, Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability, Vol. 45, 2020, p. 100-112.

Stirling, A., & Scoones, I. (2020). COVID-19 and the Futility of Control in the Modern World. Issues in
Science and Technology, 38(4), 25-27.

Siddiqui, T., Szaboova, L., Adger, W.N., Safra de Campos, R., Bhuiyan, M.R.A. and Billah, T., 2020. Policy
Opportunities and Constraints for Addressing Urban Precarity of Migrant Populations. Global Policy.

Vimalnath, P., Tietze, F., Jain, A., & Prifti, V. (2020). IP Strategies for Green Innovations – An Analysis of European Inventor Awards. 

Pratheeba Vimalnath, Frank Tietze, Elisabeth Eppinger, and Jan Sternkopf, 2020: Closed, Semi-Open, or Fully-Open? Towards an Intellectual Property Strategy Typology. Proceedings, 2020.

Eight researchers from the Gold Matters project recently participated as contributing authors for
the book “Global Gold Production Touching Ground: Expansion, Informalization, and Technological
Innovation” edited by Sara Geenen and Boris Verbrugge.

• Through twelve study cases, the book explores the expansion, informalization and technical innovation of global gold production, demonstrating how large and small-scale gold mining are both integral parts of the global gold production system, and how gold extraction is entrenched in institutional and ecological structures. Find out more and watch the videos from the book launch.

Gemenne, François. 2020. On a tous un ami noir. Fayard, 2020

• This book by François Gemenne (MISTY project) offers an alternative to the way immigration is currently debated. It builds on facts, research and testimony to show that is possible to engage with the question of immigration in a rational and calm way.

Alizèta Ouédraogo, 2020, « De l’« empowerment » des femmes lobi sur les sites d’orpaillage dans le  Sud-Ouest du Burkina Faso » [On the ’empowerment’ of Lobi women on gold-panning sites in south-west Burkina Faso], in Militance Pour la connaissance des sociétés du Sud-Ouest du Burkina Faso. Hommage à Madeleine Père, coordinated by Yamba Bidima, Michèle Cros et Quentin Mégret, L’Harmattan, pp. 171-180.

Alizèta Ouédraogo also participated in a webinar on 22 October, organized by INSUCO and Chambre des Mines du Burkina Faso on the topic « Quelle responsabilité sociale des mines face à la Covid 19 – partage d’expériences. » Ouédraogo’s presentation was on “L’orpaillage et la Covid-19 dans le sud-ouest du Burkina Faso” [Gold-panning and COVID-19 in the south-west of Burkina Faso”. Please contact Virginie Tallio if you would like to watch a recording of the webinar.

Working papers and knowledge briefs

Anjula Gurtoo and Akriti Jain, IPACST Knowledge brief on sustainability impact assessment

Viola Prifti and Elisabeth Eppinger, IPACST Knowledge brief on Intellectual Property licensing

Nancy Bocken and Roberto Hernandez Chea, IPACST Knowledge brief on Sustainable Business Models

Frank Tietze and Pratheeba Vimalnath, IPACST Knowledge brief on Intellectual Property

Webinars

Debating Development: Reflecting on Decolonial Perspectives
TRUEPATH partner, Johan Bastiaensen, was a presenter in a recent webinar on ‘A decolonial turn for development studies?’, part of a series run by the University of Antwerp Institute of Development Policy (IOB) and University foundation for Development Cooperation (USOS).

Evidence vs Myth – Understanding Displacement in a Changing Climate.
MISTY Partner, François Gemenne, was one of the panel of experts taking part in this dialogue hosted by
the IDMC (internal displacement monitoring centre) on 8 December 2020.

Streamlining Labour Recruitment through Regularisation of Middlemen, RMMRU (MISTY project partners), 29 November 2020.

 

She has also participated in the « Quelle responsabilité sociale des mines face à la Covid 19 – partage d’expériences. » webinar on the 22nd of October, organized by INSUCO and Chambre des Mines du Burkina Faso with a communication on “L’orpaillage et la Covid-19 dans le sud-ouest du Burkina Faso”.

In the press…

François Gemenne (MISTY), Rendre les camps de migrants invisibles ne les fera pas disparaître [Hiding migrant camps from view will not make them disappear], 27 November 2020, The Conversation. 

Maya Goodfellow, How helpful is the term ‘climate refugee’? 31 August 2020, The Guardian.

MISTY project partners Ricardo Safra de Campos and Caroline Zickgraf are cited in this article in relation to their expert roles giving evidence to the House of Lords EU Home Affairs sub-committee on the subject of climate refugees.

Around the web…

Big Climate Movement: Migration & displacement in times of climate change,” Migration Matters, 14 September 2020.

MISTY project partners Caroline Zickgraf and François Gemenne participate in a 12-episode series dissecting the complex interactions between climate change and migration. 

“It’s not easy but our voices and the voices of the marginalised need to be heard.”
Interview with MISTY partner Tasneem Siddiqui, (RMMRU), Asian Forum for Human Rights and
Development, 8 October 2020.

Bruno Jochum, François Gemenne: ‘We need more open borders ahead of the climate crisis’, Geneva Solutions, 11 December 2020.

By Dominique Jolivet and Mumuni Abu (MISTY project team). This post was originally shared on the MISTY project website on 15 December 2020.

As told by Eleanor Fisher, Gold Matters Project Leader.

In April and May 2020 the Brazilian team of the Gold Matters project collected data on how the COVID-
19 crisis was affecting artisanal and small-scale gold miners (ASGM) in three regions in the Brazilian
Amazon.

The published results of the investigation “Small-scale gold mining and the COVID-19 pandemic: Conflict and cooperation in the Brazilian Amazon” reveal how the impact of COVID-19 has
two sides. On the one hand, the vulnerability of miners is exposed, while on the other, their
capacity to find coping solutions is revealed.

Following this first study, the Brazilian team coordinated further data collection between May and August 2020 in the same three regions. This work was part of the World Bank-led DELVE global data gathering exercise to record specific COVID-19 impacts on ASGM communities. The collaboration included 18 organizations over 22 countries. The results of the survey are accessible on the DELVE platform.

Moreover, the World Bank’s Extractives Global Programmatic Support Fund recently granted funding for project members to propose initiatives that improve the sustainability of gold mining in relation to the use of mercury and to illegal gold trading in the community of Peixoto de Azevedo. The research is intended to contribute to building more resilient ASGM communities after the crisis. It will also inform policy-makers, academics and others about priorities, and the impacts of COVID-19 in these communities. This knowledge is important for understanding how local people can organize the sector in terms of new practices for employee healthcare, and – of course – for environmental and social sustainability.

Find out more:

J. Calvimontes, L. Massaro, C.H.X. Araujo, R.R. Moraes, J. Mello, L.C. Ferreira, M. de Theije, Small-scale gold mining and the COVID-19 pandemic: Conflict and cooperation in the Brazilian Amazon, The Extractive Industries and Society, Volume 7, Issue 4, 2020, pp. 1347-1350, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.exis.2020.08.013.

Delve. (2020). Delve COVID-19 Impact Reporting.

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All photos courtesy of Jorge Calvimontes.

In mid-November 2020 the GoST project held its third stakeholder workshop on interrogating the governance and financial implications of ‘Smart Cities’ in India. The workshop brought together a diverse set of people working on the conceptualisation, financing and implementation of ‘smart city’ projects across India, in the wider context of urbanization in India. The aim of the workshop was to develop a critical outlook on the ‘smart city’ mission in the overall landscape of governance and planning and to support researchers, activists, media representatives, public administrators, corporate executives, planners, architects, students and academics to develop a critical understanding of the implications of the ‘smart city’ mission.

An overview is available online.

See also:

Report of the Workshop on Interrogating Governance and Financial Implications of ‘Smart Cities’ (Part I) held on 12th November 2020.

Report of the Workshop on Interrogating Governance and Financial Implications of ‘Smart Cities’ (Part II) held on 19th November 2020.

Qamar ZJ & Chandrima Mazumdar, ‘Smart Cities Mission’ is anti-poor, non-inclusive, and against the consitutional mandate: Experts, RW News Network, 30 November 2020.

The workshop was organized by the Environment Support Group (ESG) and Centre for Financial Accountability (CFA) in cooperation with Harvard Kennedy School & Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research-UFZ.

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Header photo: The port of Kakinada, Andhra Pradesh (Charu Sharma via Flickr). Kakinada has been identified as part of the Government of India’s ‘Smart City’ mission.