Quarterly CEM Newsletter 2nd edition of 2015 · outlines progress made on the RLE initiative in...

Quarterly CEM Newsletter - 2nd edition of 2015

Announcements

Call for Contributions for the Forum now open

The next IUCN World Conservation Congress will take place in Hawaiʻi, USA, from 1 to 10September 2016.

This Call for Contributions invites you to propose events for the Forum (the part of the Congressopen to the wider public, 2 to 5 September). The Call will remain open until 15 October 2015 andyou will have until that date to identify partners and jointly develop your proposal.

Events at the Forum are varied and include Workshops, training and capacity-building sessions atthe Conservation Campus, Posters and Knowledge Café sessions. It is a great platform to meet anddiscuss with like-minded people. So if you would like to engage and inspire others, this is youropportunity to do so! You can submit your proposal and follow its progress on the new Congress Portal. Visit theCongress Website for the latest updates and information about the Congress

Membership of CEM Thematic Groups

We would like to encourage all CEM members who have not yet joined the maximum of threeThematic Groups to do so. Please note that this does not include the Young Professionals Network- which members under 35 automatically join.You will find on your personal portal page a list of the groups you belong to. On the CEM webpagethere is a full list of the present Thematic Groups.Please inform Pat Hawes ([email protected]) if you wish to join groups or change the groupsyou belong to. Please also let her know if you are under 35 and have not yet joined the YPN.

6th International Wildland Fire Conference, Pyeongchang, Republic of Korea, 12-16 October

2015

With the first International Wildland Fire Conference, hosted by the USA in 1989, a forum wasinitiated which aimed to share knowledge and expertise in wildland fire management, research andoperational techniques globally. The outcomes of the 2003 International Wildland Fire Summit andthe following conferences in Spain (2007) and South Africa (2011) identified priority issuesconcerning wildland fires globally. It was recommended to systematically strengthen firemanagement at national, regional (multinational) and global levels. The 6th International WildlandFire Conference will be held in the Republic of Korea in October 2015 and will build on earlierachievements and provide a forum for fire management leaders, policy makers, professionals,researchers and practitioners worldwide to discuss critical fire issues affecting communities,resources and ecosystems and work co-operatively on the development of a global wildland firemanagement strategy. Furthermore the effectiveness of the Regional Wildland Fire Networks andsupport of their links into the Global Wildland Fire Network shall be strengthened.Conference website: http://en.wildfire2015.kr/

Global Wildland Fire Network: http://www.fire.uni-freiburg.de/GlobalNetworks/globalNet.html

Environment and Gerder Index

IUCN is seeking assistance with a new project the IUCN Global Gender Office (GGO) is working on.GGO is researching new datasets and country information for the Environment and Gender Index(EGI), a database that brings together environment and gender variables in a composite index andscores countries worldwide along different dimensions and variables. GGO is looking to expand its datasets and countries surveyed. In collaboration with UN Women, theEGI team developed a dataset on women in environmental decision making and are currentlycollecting data to compile a new dataset assessing whether or not gender considerations, as well asgender focal points, are being included in national-level policies and programmes across variousenvironmental sectors and ministries. If you, or someone you know, have information for your country, we request that you please fill out ashort questionnaire: either the EGI Ministry of Environment Survey or the EGI Ministry of Women’sAffairs Survey. Both surveys can also be found at genderandenvironment.org/EGI. Once a survey iscompleted, it can either be returned to [email protected] to [email protected].

‘Mountains of our Future Earth’, Perth, Scotland, 4-8 October 2015

The Centre for Mountain Studies at Perth College, University of the Highlands & Islands, incollaboration with the Mountain Research Initiative and the Global Mountain BiodiversityAssessment is organizing a third conference – Perth III – on ‘Mountains of Our Future Earth’. Theconference is a contribution to the global Future Earth programPlanning for the conference is now well-advanced. 620 abstracts from 70 countries were submittedand reviewed by session organisers. 350 abstracts were accepted for oral presentation and 120 forposter presentation;; two participants will be supported from the CEM Commission Operating Fund.The very wide range of themes for parallel sessions and roundtables can be found here. In additionto these sessions, there will be plenary presentations by global experts. And there will be field tripson 4 October (each including a visit to a whisky distillery or winery!). Registration is now open here.

New intern ESTG

CEM Ecosystem Service Thematic Group had a second intern to work for the past 5 months on theEcosystem Services Case-studies Database (ESCD). Chantal Cornelissen, from WageningenUniversity has updated ESCD in Access and worked on a user guide. ESCD is focusing on postMillennium Ecosystem Assessment case-studies, in which the Ecosystem Services concept wasused to influence policy or management for conservation. It will allow people to learn from pastexperiences.

UNEP Global Environmental Outlook 6

Jacob Park (Thematic Lead, CEM Ecosystems and Private Sector;; [email protected]) has beenselected as the Regional Coordinating Lead Author (North America) for UNEP GlobalEnvironmental Outlook 6 http://www.unep.org/geo/. Jacob was also awarded the EnvironmentalMerit Award http://www.epa.gov/region1/ra/ema/ from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency(Region 1) in April 2015 for his climate change/environmental educational activities.

Science and Education Publishing

On behalf of "Science and Education Publishing" CEM member Romeo Ekoungoulou would like toinvite CEM members to be editor or reviewer of the new journal entitled "Applied Ecology andForestry Science" (http://www.sciepub.com/journal/AEFS/AimsAndScope). Please find moreinformation

here: http://cmsdata.iucn.org/downloads/invitation_message_to_editors_and_reviewers.docx

From the members

Workshop on Eco-DRR in Nepal concluded minutes before earthquake struckA joint IUCN - UNEP - University of Lausanne workshop in Kathmandu and Pokhara, Nepal on thetopic of Ecosystem-based disaster risk reduction (Eco-DRR) was held 21-25 April, 2015. The mainobjective of the workshop was to engage with policy makers about the importance of disasterprevention with a focus on "Eco-safe roads" in Nepal. Policy makers were invited to visit the threeEPIC roadside bio-engineering sites in the Pokhara / Panchase area district. The last site visit inBhat Khola village, Syangja District concluded five minutes before the 7.8 magnitude earthquakestruck. Fortunately none of the residents of Bhat Khola were injured nor were any of the workshopparticipants. Many others were less fortunate and our thoughts are with the victims and affectedpeople of Nepal., especially after a second large earthquake affected Nepal on May 12. We canonly hope that this tragedy leads to lessons learned and concrete actions for improved post-disastermanagement and a more prevention-oriented disaster management approach inNepal. http://epaper.thehimalayantimes.com/Details.aspx?id=2530&boxid=29027926&dat=4/22/2015For more information, please contact Karen Sudmeier ([email protected]) IUCN CEMThematic lead on Eco-DRR

Campus Biodiversity Portal for awareness generation about Urban biodiversityDr. Shalini Dhyani, Co-Lead YPN for CEM, with her team members Er. Poonam Prasad, Mr. NihalG. and Mrs. Pooja F. developed and launched a first of it’s kind campus NEERI (NationalEnvironmental Engineering Research Institute) Biodiversity portal of India on 8th April 2014. TheNEERI Biodiversity Portal is a web based interactive biodiversity knowledge resource platform tooffer information about biodiversity of forests spread in 48 ha. area of her campus. The portal isnamed “NEERI Biodiversity portal”. It is designed to harness knowledge, enhance participation andestablish a participatory platform under the mandates of Aichi targets and UN decade forbiodiversity. The portal is expected to be of interest to researchers, professionals, policy makers,educators, naturalists, hobbyists, students, as well as the curious citizen. In due course we will havesufficient data, based on widespread participation, to provide information on the occurrence anddistribution of all the plant and animal (avifauna;; mammals and butterfly) species present in NEERI,Nagpur campus.Weblink: http://14.139.125.42/biodiversity/splash.php

Freshwater salinizationNoa Sainz, CEM member and PhD student in Marine and Coastal Management, has presented hislatest work on freshwater salinization at SETAC Europe 25th Annual Meeting held from 3-7 May inBarcelona (barcelona.setac.eu). During his presentation he showed the effects of anthropogenicsalinization on the Guadiana Estuary, a natural border between Spain and Portugal and protectedby several overlapping nature protection laws and international conventions. Particularly, the studydescribed the effects of salinity increase on traditional sea salt extraction carried out in thePortuguese semi-natural saltmarshes. The changes in sea salt production during the last 50 yearswas assessed takingn into account the different salinities of the tidal inlet that supplies brine water

to the salt ponds.For more information: [email protected]

Budongo Forest Reserve becomes the first registered Verified Conservation Area

In May 2015, the Budongo Forest Reserve became the first registered Verified Conservation Area(VCA). Budongo is the largest block of natural high forest in Uganda and home to a large (800+)population of wild chimpanzees. The forest is under a number of threats including neighbouringsugarcane plantations, illegal logging, illegal snaring and trapping, and encroachment by immigrantfarmers. VCA registration requires the submission of an audited management plan. The Reserve is seeking funding to implement its conservation actions as set out in its plan. Both the plan and theaudit are publicly listed on the VCA Registry at http://v-c-a.org/areas/ug/budongo.For more information on the Verified Conservation Areas please contact CEM member FrancisVorhies ([email protected])

SOIMON project

Prof.dr.sc. Zdravko Spiric, (Member of CEM & Director of OIKON - Institute for Applied Ecology andprofessor at Medical faculty in Rijeka, Croatia), is a coordinator of the research project SOIMON(New Fast and Reliable Technology for Soil Inspection in Contaminated Sites with MachineryCondition Monitoring).The SOIMON project will develop an in-situ soil sensing system that is deployed in a sonic drillmachine. The complete system/ bore pipes are going to be equipped with condition monitoringsensors in order to increase lifetime, enhance drilling time and cost and reliability of the soilmonitoring process. Currently, characterisation techniques of contaminated sites suffer from the complete absence of afast and reliable in-situ method. The most common technique involves the laboratory analysis of thesamples, a method rather time-consuming and expensive.The SOIMON project targets to bridge this gap through the development of an automated systemcapable of performing in-situ and real-time soil analysis, using drills with built in Sensors array forOrganic Compounds detection and heavy metal inspection. The former will be investigated using Insitu radiometric sensors.More information: www.soimon.eu/ or [email protected]

IUCN Red List of Ecosystems progress

The IUCN Red List of Ecosystems (RLE) programme continues to grow rapidly. A recent reportoutlines progress made on the RLE initiative in 2014-2015, including development of listing criteriaand their application, ecosystem assessment work in the regions, ongoing research and policydevelopment, communications, capacity building, and key challenges for the immediate future. A listof peer-reviewed RLE publications is also included. Find the report on the Union Portal here. Themulti-disciplinary RLE Committee for Scientific Standards – with expertise in terrestrial, freshwaterand marine ecosystem ecology, classification and mapping, remote sensing, conservation planningand ecological modelling – held its first meeting in March 2015, hosted by the Finnish EnvironmentInstitute in Helsinki. Among the topics discussed were a framework for a global ecosystem typology,spatial and thematic scaling of ecosystems and risk assessments, and development of an

arctic/boreal assessment. For more information contact Rebecca Miller ([email protected]) or

visit www.iucnredlistofecosystems.org.

New study by CEM member Ross JeffreeThe ecological restoration of aquatic environments that have been impacted by contaminants over

long periods of time needs to consider the possibility of Darwinian/Wallacean natural selection

leading to unexpected outcomes in resident biota. Contaminant levels in two fishes from the Finniss

River in tropical northern Australia, were studied along a metal pollution gradient draining the Rum

Jungle copper/uranium mine, a contaminant source over five decades. Paradoxically, populations of

both fish species exposed to the highest concentrations of mine-related metals (cobalt, copper,

lead, manganese, nickel, uranium and zinc) in surface water and sediment had the lowest tissue

(bone, liver and muscle) concentrations of these metals. The degree of reduction in tissue

concentrations of exposed populations was also specific to each metal and inversely related to its

degree of environmental increase above background. The most plausible interpretation of these

results is that populations of both fish species have modified kinetics within their metal

bioaccumulation physiology, via adaptation or tolerance responses, to reduce their body burdens of

metals.

Jeffree RA, Markich SJ, Twining JR (2014) Diminished Metal Accumulation in Riverine Fishes

Exposed to Acid Mine Drainage over Five Decades. PLoS ONE 9(3): e91371.

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0091371.

For more information please contact CEM member Ross Jeffree, [email protected]

Journal of Lao Studies publishes women fishers paper by Charlotte MoserJournal of Lao Studies (March 2015) has published the peer-reviewed paper "Listening to Women

Fishers on the Sekong River: Fostering Resilience in Village Fishery Co-Management" by CEM

member Charlotte Moser. The paper is an outcome of a 2013 project conducted on the Sekong

River in southern Lao PDR with support from CGIAR, the Asia Foundation, and IUCN-Lao PDR.

The project was presented in January 2015 as a poster session at the Global Inland Fisheries

Conference at the UN Food & Agriculture Organization in Rome, Italy.

More here: http://www.laostudies.org/content/special-issue-1-march-2015

Loss of Freshwater Ecosystems : A major threat to Fishes and AmphibiansNowadays, we are facing massive loss of freshwater ecosystems throughout the world due to

higher population growth rate, and simultaneously, increasing demand of huge quantities of

freshwater for drinking and irrigation. Plenty of irrigation drinking water projects are built up along

the big rivers, lakes, and canals. Many hydroelectric projects are going on to produce electricity;;

more yet to be made. All this has caused the degradation of major freshwater ecosystems

throughout the world, which in turn eradicated a large number of freshwater fish and amphibian

species, and also threatened many.

Many freshwater fish and amphibian species live in ponds, canals, ditches, reservoirs, etc. They

also serve as bio-indicators in their habitats. The farmers are draining water from these water

bodies to facilitate irrigation. A large number of freshwater fish (such as, Rita rita,

Amblypharyngodon, Tuna, Chela, Colisa, Boleophthalmus,etc.) and amphibians (such as, Rana,

Bufo etc.) are under threat.

More information on this study: Prof. Jyotirmoy Shankar Deb, Faculty of Zoology, Barasat College,

Kolkata, India ([email protected])

CEM member named to head USAID Wildlife Crime Tech Challenge (WCTC)USAID has launched the Wildlife Crime Tech Challenge (WCTC) as a global biodiversity initiative.

The project, headed by CEM member Scott Hajost ([email protected]), is a partnership

between USAID and the National Geographic Society, the Smithsonian Institution, and TRAFFIC. It

will award Grand Prizes of up to $500,000 for the most impactful and scalable science and tech

solutions to combat trafficking of terrestrial and marine wildlife. Wildlife trafficking damages

ecosystems through the loss of species and heightened violence as well as reducing prospects for

sustainable development through nature-based tourism, an important source of revenue in many

developing countries. For information, visit www.wildlifecrimetech.org.

Towards a better way in conserving biodiversity of sacred grove by local communityIn Nepal, sacred landscapes represent an indigenous long-held tradition of conserving specific

forest areas and have received considerable attention in conserving biodiversity from a sociological,

cultural and religious perspective. Nepal’s rich ethnic diversity with different religious customs,

myths and beliefs has been practicing generation old religious traditions by establishing sacred

groves devoted to their deities. Despite strong religious beliefs and taboos, poor rural Nepalese

communities depend upon the local forest resources to sustain livelihoods leading towards

biodiversity and habitat loss. In a recent comparative study, between government managed and

community managed sacred groves in Kathmandu Valley, it was found that the involvement of local

communities, that have an old and indigenous tradition of conserving local resources, have

contributed more efficiently to conserving local biodiversity by managing sacred groves. Sacred

groves in Nepal are facing severe threats and need immediate attention to protect their declining

species diversity and conserve local ecosystems.

For more information on the study please contact Mohan P. Devkota, Department of Botany, Amrit

campus, Tribhuvan University, Kathmandu, Nepal. Email: [email protected]

“A New Map of Global Ecological Land Units – An Ecophysiographic StratificationApproach”

“A New Map of Global Ecological Land Units – An Ecophysiographic Stratification Approach,”produced by CEM member Dr. Roger Sayre of the U.S. Geological Survey and his team, has beenpublished by the Association of American Geographers. http://www.aag.org/cs/global_ecosystems. The products (publication, map, data, and browser/tour apps) were launched at the ACES (ACommunity for Ecosystem Services) Conference in September 2014 by U.S. Secretary of theInterior Sally Jewell as part of President Barack Obama’s Climate Data Initiative for EcosystemVulnerability. The mapping approach first characterizes the climate regime, the landforms, thegeology, and the land cover of the Earth, and then models terrestrial ELUs as a combination ofthose four land surface characteristics. The data are available for ftp download in the public domain,or as ArcGIS Online (AGOL) content. In AGOL, the data are streamed for web mapping andanalysis, and can be integrated and leveraged with a number of human and environmentaldatalayers from Esri’s Living Atlas.

Publications

Elodie Reveillac, Thomas Lacoue-Labarthe;; FrançoisOberhänsli;; Jean-Louis Teyssié;; Ross Jeffree;; Jean-PierreGattuso;; Sophie Martin (2014). Ocean acidification reshapesthe otolith-body allometry of growth in juvenile seabream.JEMBE. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jembe.2014.11.007. Goldammer, J.G. (ed.) 2013. Vegetation Fires and GlobalChange: Challenges for Concerted International Action. A WhitePaper directed to the United Nations and InternationalOrganizations. A publication of the Global Fire MonitoringCenter (GFMC). Kessel Publishing House, 400 p., ISBN 978-3-941300-78-1 (http://www.forestrybooks.com/) Keith D.A., Rodríguez J.P., Brooks T.M., Burgman M.A., BarrowE.G., Bland L., Comer P.J., Franklin J., Link J., McCarthy M.A.,Miller R.M., Murray N.J., Nel J., Nicholson E., Oliveira-MirandaM.A., Regan T.J., Rodríguez-Clark K.M., Rouget M. & SpaldingM.D. (2015).The IUCN Red List of Ecosystems: motivations,challenges and applications.Conservation Letters [doi:10.1111/conl.12167] Availablehere:http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/conl.12167/epdf Loh, Miranda;; Cherrie, John;; Pronk, Anjoeka;; Kuijpers, Eelco;;Schieberle, Christian;; A. Stamatelopoulou, Asimina;;Chapizanis, Dimitris;; Bartzis, John;; Špirić, Zdravko;; Sarigiannis,Denis: A comparison study of location and activity monitoringfor exposure studies // 24th Annual Meeting of The InternationalSociety of Exposure Science - Abstract Book / Buckley, TimothyJ. ;; . Melnyk, Lisa Jo (ur.).Cincinnati, Ohio, USA : InternationalSociety of Exposure Science (ISES), 2014. 254-254 Nathalie Hilmi, Denis Allemand, Mine Cinar, Sarah Cooley,Jason M Hall-Spencer, Gunnar Haraldsson, Caroline Hattam,Ross A. Jeffree, James C. Orr, Katrin Rehdanz, StéphanieReynaud, Alain Safa and Sam Dupont (2014). Exposure ofMediterranean Countries to Ocean Acidification, Water 2014, 6,1719-1744;; doi:10.3390/w6061719.

Price MF (2015) Transnational governance in mountain regions:Progress and prospects,Environmental Science & Policy 49: 95-105. doi: 10.1016/j.envsci.2014.09.009.

Other Commissions

Newsletters

World Commission on

Protected Areas

Commission on

Education and

Communication

Commission on

Environmental Law

Species Survival

Commission

Commission on

Environmental,

Economic and Social

Policy

Rosales, M. (2015). Análisis de los Principios y Directrices de

Addis Abeba para la Utilización Sostenible de la Diversidad

Biológica.Rosales, M. (2015) Synthetic Biology and Biological

Diversity Conservation Potential Positives and Negatives

Impacts.

Špirić, Zdravko;; Stafilov, Trajce, Vučković, Ivana: Mercury

concentrations in mosses in Croatia // ICP Vegetation 28th Task

Force Meeting - book of abstracts / Harmens, Harry ;; Mills, Gina

;; Hayes, Felicity (ur.). Roma : ICP Vegetation Programme

Coordination Centre, 2015. 49-49 (predavanje,međunarodna

recenzija,sažetak,znanstveni).

Quarterly CEM Newsletter 2nd edition of 2015 · outlines progress made on the RLE initiative in...

Documents

Transcript of Quarterly CEM Newsletter 2nd edition of 2015 · outlines progress made on the RLE initiative in...