Pedon 23 - Physical Land Resources - Universiteit Gent

MEETINGS
The GSP’s mission is to support and facilitate joint
efforts towards sustainable management of soil
resources for food security and climate change
adaptation and mitigation.
Through enhanced and applied knowledge of soil
resources as well as improved global governance and
standardization, the partnership will:
create and promote awareness among decision
makers and stakeholders on the key role of soil
resources for sustainable land management and
sustainable development;
address critical soil issues in relation to food
security and climate change adaptation and
mitigation;
guide soil knowledge and research through a
common global communication platform
incorporating real local challenges;
establish an active and effective network for
addressing soil crosscutting issues, and;
develop global governance guidelines aiming to
improved soil protection and sustainable soil
productivity.
Further information available on the FAO website
(http://www.fao.org/).
Eric Van Ranst
Wageningen Conference on Applied Soil Science
September 18-22, 2011, Wageningen, The Netherlands
With the first Wageningen Conference on Applied Soil
Science, from 18 to 22 September 2011, a new series of
tri-annual conferences on Soil Science, organized by the
Soil Science Centre of Wageningen University, was
launched.
This first edition, entitled “Soil Science in a Changing
World”, addressed the importance of soil science for
combating and mitigating the challenges of our time: food
security, water resources, climate change, ensuring
biodiversity and how to govern these issues and create
policy for taking measures. Instead of the disciplinary
organization of most conferences, a thematic approach
thus had been adopted and each day of the conference
handled 2 of these thematic issues.
In response to the generally low profile of many soil
scientists in these matters, the conference aimed to offer a
platform for sharing knowledge of soils across the world
and across science, for engaging in interdisciplinary
exchanges of ideas, thoughts, and opinions, and to
promote thinking out of the box, being innovative and
creative. This international conference attracted over 250
experts in the various fields and the congress program
targeted this sharing of knowledge with keynote speakers
followed by debates. Participants could furthermore
choose between attending oral presentations or
participating in workshops, whereas the poster presenters
received 1 minute time (strictly checked by a ticking
clock projected on the screen) to introduce their research
and invite the public to their poster. Several session
chairs furthermore mobilized their session contributors to
develop draft opinion papers for publication.
For more details on the conference program and topics
addressed, I would like to recommend to have a look to
the book of abstracts and presentations of the keynote
speakers. Both can be accessed through the conference
website on http://www.wageningensoilmeeting.wur.nl/
UK/.
The meeting also resulted in the launch of the Global Soil
Biodiversity Initiative (GSBI). The GSBI, composed of 5
leading representatives of different universities in US, the
Netherlands, UK and the Joint Research Centre, will be
responsible for the development of an active platform
promoting the translation of expert knowledge on soil
biodiversity into environmental policy, in order to assure
management and enhancement of ecosystem services. It
mainly aims at exploiting the already available
knowledge in the field to maximum potential. The GSBI
will contribute biodiversity knowledge to the Global Soil
Partnership that brings together 3 international
agreements interested in sustaining soils: the Convention
on Biological Diversity, the UN Convention on
Desertification, the UN Framework Convention on
Climate Change and will be operated by the Food and
Agriculture Organization. For more information on the
GSBI and how to join it, you can have a look to the
website http://www.globalsoilbiodiversity.org/.
Ann Verdoodt
International Conference on Climate Change and
Food Security (ICCCFS): “How Can Agriculture
Respond to Climate Change to Ensure Food Security”
November 6-8, 2011, Beijing, China
The International Conference on Climate Change and Food
Security (ICCCFS), held in the Friendship Hotel in
Beijing, November 6-8, was organized by the Chinese
Academy of Agricultural Sciences (CAAS) and the
International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), and
sponsored by the National Science Foundation of China,
the CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change,
Agriculture and Food Security, and the Project Adapting to
Climate Change in China. The event included technical
sessions, poster sessions, and social events. Prof. Dr.
Huajun Tang, Vice-president of CAAS and ITC-Ghent
alumnus (M.Sc. ITC-Ghent, 1987 and Ph.D. ITC-Ghent,
1993) chaired the entire conference and Dr. Liming Ye,
project leader at the Institute of Agricultural Resources and
Regional Planning of CAAS and PLR-UGent alumnus
(M.Sc. PLR, 1999 and Ph.D. in Geology, 2008), orally
presented his research findings on food security and
climate change in China; output of his Ph.D. and Postdoc
research he did at the Laboratory of Soil Science of the
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