Environmental Science

Deltas are coastal Social Political Environmental Systems (SPES) characterised by the interplay between rivers, lands and oceans, influenced by a combination of riverine and oceanic processes, shaped by human interventions under strong state water control management policies. Deltas provide numerous resources such as fertile land and water for irrigated and intensive agriculture, fisheries, abundant biodiversity as well as non-farm activities. Thanks to their location at the interface of lower valleys and the sea, and their fluvial connections, trade and exchange have flourished and led to the development and expansion of some of the world’s largest metropolises. Asia is home to the largest and most populated deltas in the world. However, deltas are recognised as one of the most vulnerable coastal environments. They face a range of threats operating at multiple scales, from global climate change (CC) and sea-level rise (SLR) to various hazards (floods, erosion, salinization, subsidence), local anthropogenic activities and land use changes. Deltas are relevant sites for adaptation to CC studies, given they are dynamic systems where communities have a long record of adapting to natural hazards and are accustomed to being highly exposed to environmental risks. Local populations whose livelihoods depend on natural resources have adapted in different ways to live with floods. Objectives The MOVINDELTAS project intends to understand the challenges for deltaic populations when their livelihoods are at risk due to environmental/climatic and global economic changes, and their adaptive capacity sustainability through the current scenarios in the Ganges-Brahmapoutra-Meghna and Mekong deltas. The project approach isinterdisciplinary, multi-scale and long term(past history experiences and forecasting) from four perspectives: i) a physical and environmental assessment of risks posed by multi-hazards linked to adaptive strategies, ii) a socio-economic vulnerability assessment of the population exposed to these hazards, iii) an assessment of the population and local stakeholders’ perception of risk in the risk hotspots, and iv) a projection of how the risk is expected to evolve in the coming decades, with climate changes in the GBM and Mekong deltas. Through its various components, MOVINDELTAS aims to meet several specific objectives: Enhance the understanding of the dynamics of deltaic Social Political Environmental Systems (SPES), and the level of sustainability of deltaic population livelihoods under multi-hazard environmental change. Define the complexity of new patterns of mobility and immobility/migration and non-migration, (involuntary) displacement and translocal livelihoods (across multiple locations, gender, cultures and social classes) in delta regions defined as risk hotspots. Assess the various adaptive strategies and community responses to multi-hazards under expected environmental change in risk hotspots, through model-scenarios/CC in a new context of global CC. Conduct an in-depth and evidence-based analysis of the differentiated perceptions, sensitivity and experiences of men and women in their strategies for coping with environmental, global and climate changes. Include stakeholders in an iterative consultative process throughout the project in order to better understand their perspectives, develop informed models and maximise the potential impact of policy response. Under this specific objective, experience sharing between deltas and the use of local knowledge on adaptation strategies in vulnerable flood deltas will allow future learning, and contribute to the sustainability of the proposed methodology. In fact, the Nile delta is the perfect environmental configuration for a test case as it has several converging and divergent parameters characteristic of South-East-Asia. Partnerships : 27 partners from 4 European countries (France, UK, Germany and Netherland), 4 Asian countries (Vietnam, Cambodia, India, Bangladesh) and Egypt.

The direct dependence of humans on ecosystem services is by far strongest in developing regions where poverty restricts access to resources. This dependency also makes people in developing countries more sensitive to climate change than their developed counterparts. Increasing human populations deteriorates natural habitat, biodiversity and ecosystems services which spiral into poverty and low human welfare. This calls for innovative solutions that encompass the entire socio-ecological-economic system, as recognized on a global scale in the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment. However, innovative and practical solutions require downscaling to regional levels for identifying concrete sets of drivers of change. For Africa specifically, the interplay of human population growth, land use change, climate change and human well-being is a major challenge. This project focuses on the Serengeti-Maasai Mara Ecosystem and associated agricultural areas, a region in East Africa that encompasses parts of Kenya and Tanzania. The ecosystem is world-famous for key aspects of its biodiversity, such as the migration of 1.3 million wildebeest. This ‘flagship ecosystem’ role will enhance the international interest in the project. In this project, internationally leading researchers from Norway, the Netherlands, Scotland, Denmark and Germany are teaming up with strong local partners in Tanzania and Kenya. The research will be organised in seven interlinked work packages: 1) assemble and integrate the so far separate Kenyan and Tanzanian relevant data on the region; 2) quantify the connections between human population growth, land use change, climate change and biodiversity change; 3) test how biodiversity change leads to changes in key ecosystem services; 4) quantify the dependence of human livelihoods on these ecosystem services. We will implement innovative ways for communication and dissemination of the results of ‘continuous engagement’ by local stakeholders.

The direct dependence of humans on ecosystem services is by far strongest in developing regions where poverty restricts access to resources. This dependency also makes people in developing countries more sensitive to climate change than their developed counterparts. Increasing human populations deteriorates natural habitat, biodiversity and ecosystems services which spiral into poverty and low human welfare. This calls for innovative solutions that encompass the entire socio-ecological-economic system, as recognized on a global scale in the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment. However, innovative and practical solutions require downscaling to regional levels for identifying concrete sets of drivers of change. For Africa specifically, the interplay of human population growth, land use change, climate change and human well-being is a major challenge. This project focuses on the Serengeti-Maasai Mara Ecosystem and associated agricultural areas, a region in East Africa that encompasses parts of Kenya and Tanzania. The ecosystem is world-famous for key aspects of its biodiversity, such as the migration of 1.3 million wildebeest. This ‘flagship ecosystem’ role will enhance the international interest in the project. In this project, internationally leading researchers from Norway, the Netherlands, Scotland, Denmark and Germany are teaming up with strong local partners in Tanzania and Kenya. The research will be organised in seven interlinked work packages: 1) assemble and integrate the so far separate Kenyan and Tanzanian relevant data on the region; 2) quantify the connections between human population growth, land use change, climate change and biodiversity change; 3) test how biodiversity change leads to changes in key ecosystem services; 4) quantify the dependence of human livelihoods on these ecosystem services. We will implement innovative ways for communication and dissemination of the results of ‘continuous engagement’ by local stakeholders.

WEGO (Well-being, Ecology, Gender and cOmmunity) is a trans-national network aims to develop a shared research and training agenda to educate the next generation of interdisciplinary social-environmental scientists on feminist political ecology in Europe. WeGO’s research examines gender relations in community organizing from a feminist-informed political ecology (FPE) framework. From an international and interdisciplinary perspective, WEGO looks at gender and power relations in community responses to the current climate, economic and environmental crises in different socio-ecological contexts. WEGO aims to provide insightful and compelling analysis about the importance of gendered community response to climate, economic and environmental change as well as more detailed knowledge about what changes are required for greater resilience and sustainability. Gender is understood as a critical variable in shaping resource access and control, interacting with class, caste, race, culture, and ethnicity to shape processes of ecological change and the prospects of any community for sustainable development. WEGO research will look at resilience and sustainability by examining the gendered role of women in care work for the community and for the environment. The cases chosen – from in and outside of Europe are sites that can feed into innovative European Policy on sustainable development.

This project seeks to improve research capacity and develop collaboration amongst researchers in Europe and East Africa, and by doing so to contribute to the larger objective of regional integration. The project will enhance integration in the research community in both Europe and East Africa through bringing researchers together in a series of training activities. These activities will focus on two kinds of transborder environment: mountains and Lake Tanganyika. Through this focus on resources which span the borders of the multiple political units of East Africa, the project will contribute directly to public understanding of some of the challenges to regional integration in East African context. The project is organized around four themes, all of which relate to human use and management of these cross border resources: resource management and livelihood sustainability, environmental and climate change, migration and identity and the role of small and medium cities. At the core of the project, five institutions – four European, and one East African – will be brought together; the project will also draw on the skills and knowledge of four university research institutions in Europe, whose staff will take the role of leaders for each of the four themes. All the individuals and institutions involved have substantial experience of work in Africa, and have commitment both to the enhancement of an integrated European research capacity and to the building of research capacity and regional integration in East Africa.

Responding to climate change has profound implications for behaviour; yet policies to achieve this change have met with limited success. A key challenge for environmental social scientists is the need to move forward in understanding how to bring about change in consumption, community and political behaviours, which is commensurate to the scale of the climate change challenge. One promising area is ‘behavioural spillover’, the notion that taking up a new behaviour (e.g., recycling) may lead to adoption of other, more environmentally beneficial, behaviours. Such a notion appears to hold the promise of changing a suite of behaviours in a cost-effective way. Yet despite robust theoretical principles (e.g., self-perception theory) underpinning behavioural spillover, there is little empirical research. The proposed research intends to produce a step-change in behavioural and sustainability science by undertaking a mixed-method, cross-cultural study of pro-environmental behavioural spillover in order to open up new ways of promoting sustainable lifestyle change and significantly broadening our understanding of behaviour within individuals and cultures. There are three objectives for the research: 1. To examine ways in which pro-environmental behaviour, lifestyles and spillover are understood and develop within different cultures; 2. To understand drivers of behavioural consistency and spillover effects across contexts, including home and work, and cultures; and 3. To develop a theoretical framework for behavioural spillover and test interventions to promote spillover across different contexts and cultures. Three Work Packages will address these objectives: 1. Defining and understanding spillover: Focus groups with biographical questions and card sorts [Years 1-2] 2. Examining drivers of spillover: Cross-national survey with factor, correlation and regression analyses [Years 2-3] 3. Developing theory and testing interventions: Laboratory and field experiments [Years 3-5]

Against the background of climate change, the study of environmentally induced displacement has become increasingly significant. Objectives • to provide a systematic review of the legal aspects of climate related displacement. • to analyse to what extent the current EU framework for immigration and asulum in general and the specific instruments in regard to asylum in particular already offer adequate responses to climate induced displacement. • to assess how the legal framework could evolve in order to provide an improved response to the phenomenon of climate refugees. • to clarify in which way such a modified legal framework can be rooted in the Lisbon Treaty. Outcomes The analysis reviews both the status quo as well as the possible evolution of the policy framework in place in order to arrive at more comprehensive responses to environmentally induced migration, while establishing the possible legal bases of different types of responses within the Treaty of Lisbon. • The first part of the study aims to develop a typology of environmentally induced migration which serves as a basis for identifying adequate policy responses, and in particular for different forms and dimensions of this phenomenon. • The second part focuses on a revision of the global debates on policy responses to environmentally induced displacement, which embeds the analysis of the European policy context in wider global policy debates and provides the framework under which the European policy framework is analysed. • The third and core part of the study looks at the policy framework in place at the level of the European Union to identify possible policy responses under the current EU policy framework that would address environmentally induced displacement as well as gaps and possible directions how this framework can evolve.

The IKETIS project will seek to raise awareness in the UK of the need for action to address climate change induced migration and will focus on the mediation of the climate refugees’ issue. The first aim of the action is to understand the representational practices that shape media and NGOs discourse about climate refugees. The second aim is to build capacity of journalists, NGOs and policy-makers, key intermediaries in the mediation of climate change induced migration, to enhance social support for policy actions. Together, both aims contribute to the transformation of how climate change induced migration is perceived and provide new patterns of critical thinking and civic engagement. The research consists of four phases: i) identify the policy, institutional and definitional factors that may impede meaningful media discourse on the issue ii) perform critical discourse analysis (image and text) and frame analysis of the representations of climate change induced migration of UK online news media iii) using these findings, then move on to examine how UK humanitarian and environmental NGOs utilise and challenge frames identified by online news media coverage of climate displacement and iv) based on the understanding of the representational practices that formulate climate refugees mediated discourse, promote climate justice approach to frame climate change and build capacity of journalists, NGOs and policy-makers to best use climate justice approach through e-learning strategies. This training-through research scheme will provide the applicant with the necessary skills to develop competences in media theory, visual communication, critical discourse and frame analysis and digital media research and plan an academic career track for a better integration into the academic community, while the applicant will be of specific benefit to the research-informed teaching that forms the basis of the host institution’s approach to undergraduate and postgraduate teaching practice.

Das Projekt untersucht die Auswirkungen von Klimaschocks auf das Wohlergehen und Verhalten von Haushalten in der Mongolei. Insbesondere werden dabei extreme Wetterereignisse, sogenannte Dzud-Katastrophen, betrachtet (siehe Kasten). Mit fortschreitendem Klimawandel ist damit zu rechnen, dass solche Klimaschocks häufiger und in extremeren Umfang auftreten werden. Im Rahmen des Projekts wird eine Panelhaushaltsbefragung zu Klimaschocks und sozio-ökonomischer Vulnerabilität von Haushalten in der westlichen Mongolei erhoben. Die Anpassungsstrategien von Nomaden zur Bewältigung von Klimaschocks und die Verteilungswirkungen von Klimaschocks werden anhand mikro-ökonometrischer Methoden analysiert.