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Greetings from C-CIARN Agriculture, As noted in our March 06 Update, C-CIARN Agriculture continues to be in a transition phase while plans for developing and maintaining our services and resources are solidified. We will inform our network members about our status as soon as it is decided. 1. Symposium on Sustainable Agriculture, Communities & Environments in the Pacific Northwest May 18-20 Richland, Washington, USA Since the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) entered into force in January 1994, dynamics of agricultural production and trade in the Pacific Northwest have changed dramatically. Large-scale, export-oriented agriculture is vulnerable to global business cycles, competition from low-waged producers, labor shortages, the spread of pests and disease, changing consumer tastes and preferences, and other dynamics. Continuing global changes, including also rising petroleum prices and shifting weather patterns, have important implications for agriculture, communities and environments in the Pacific Northwest, where agriculture has been a major source of economic vitality for over a century. Some changes present opportunities for new products, markets, and community development. How have growers, agriculture-related businesses, communities and social institutions, and others responded to these threats & opportunities? What further changes and innovations are required to strengthen foundations for sustainability in the region? Such questions will be addressed at this symposium on "Sustainable Agriculture, Communities, and Environments in the Pacific Northwest" at Washington State University. For more information, go to www.tricity.wsu.edu/crs/ 2. HOLIVAR2006 Conference June 12-15, 2006 Natural Climate Variability and Global Warming Environmental Change Research Centre, University College London, UK Registration deadline: May 1, 2006 Detailed information:www.holivar2006.org 3.Crises in Agriculture and Resource Sectors: Analysis of Policy Responses October 15, 16 &17, 2006 Calgary, Alberta, Canada Registration Opens June 15, 2006 Conference Location Details available here Women and Climate Change Spring 2007 Women and Environments International Magazine is looking for submissions for its upcoming issue on climate change. This issue will contribute to meetings and discussions of the UN Commission on Sustainable Development and UN Framework Convention on Climate Change in 2006 and 2007. We encourage submissions that analyze climate change from diverse perspectives of gender, sexual identity, race, class, ability, age, socio-cultural and regional differences among others. Case studies are particularly welcome. Deadlines: Abstracts or indications of interest by June 15, 2006 Final Manuscripts by Aug 30th, 2006. Special Issue Disasters: Natural Disasters and Climate Change Access document 1. The School of Earth and Environment, University of Leeds in the UK (www.see.leeds.ac.uk) is creating a series of tenured research positions in the area of climate and environmental change. These positions will be jointly appointed to various of the school’s research institutes, including the Sustainability Research Institute and the Institute for Atmospheric Science. The goal is to bring on board established researchers who will be able to develop innovative and inter-disciplinary research programmes across existing research strengths. Further particulars can be found off link 2. Pew Center on Global Climate Change, Arlington, Virginia, USA International Fellow Starting Date: May/June 2006 Details here Alberta's drying up U of Alberta Web News Service | by Phoebe Dey | April 3, 2006 The Canadian Prairies are facing an unprecedented water crisis due to a combination of climate warming, increased human activity and historic drought, according to new research by University of Alberta's Dr. David Schindler, one of the world's leading environmental scientists. "The Western Prairies are worse than other areas of Canada," said Schindler, co-author of a paper published in the journal Proceedings of National Academy of Sciences, early onlie editon. One of the referees of this paper said, "wow, it's like looking out the window of the locomotive 10 seconds before the train crashes. It's a very dire situation." Although most global studies rank Canada among the top five countries in terms of per-capita water supply, those rankings can be deceptive, argued Schindler and Dr. Bill Donahue, who co-authored the paper. Canada's Western Prairie Provinces (WPP), for example, have an area of 2 million kms that lie in the rain shadow of the Rocky Mountains and, as a result, are the driest large area of southern Canada. Little research has been done on the cumulative effects of climate warming, drought and human activity on water shortages. Interview - Scientists Breed Rice to Defy Climate Change Planet Ark | April 12, 2006 Los Banos, Philippines - Scientists are developing new flood and drought-prone rice varieties to combat the threat of global warming to Asia's food staple but more work is needed, the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) said. The institute needs US$25 million over the next 5 to 7 years to study the impact of rising temperatures, higher concentrations of greenhouse gases and greater extremes of droughts and floods on rice production, the IRRI director-general told Reuters on Tuesday. "We have a wide range of research programmes that are addressing issues directly relating to climate change and rising temperatures," said Robert Zeigler at the IRRI headquarters in Los Banos, in the foothills of Mount Makiling near Manila. "We have rice varieties that will be released in the near future that are more tolerant to flooding than currently available varieties," he said. Zeigler also said the institute was developing rice lines that were tolerant of drought, and had just begun research on rice that could withstand high temperatures. The institute, credited for helping the world feed itself by developing high-yielding rice during the so-called Green Revolution of the 1960s, is also helping with work on genetically modified Vitamin A enriched rice or "golden rice". All for now, Ellen Wall ewall@uoguelph.ca Co-ordinator, C-CIARN Agriculture (Canadian Climate Impacts and Adaptation Research Network for Agriculture) Blackwood Hall (Room 202) University of Guelph. Guelph, Ontario, Canada N1G 2W1 Phone: 519 824 4120 ext 58480 Fax: 519 763 4686 http://www.c-ciarn.uoguelph.ca |
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