Posts Tagged ‘agriculture#8217;

As the academic year advances and we see the lectures end, our students start their internships. This year we are overjoyed to see our students involved in challenging and exciting projects in a myriad of institutions.

Just to give you some salient examples, one of our students will navigate the international scene at the UNDP providing support to the UN Millennium Development Goals Campaign organising public participation on post 2015 consultations in Spain. A further international institution, the Consortium of International Agricultural Research Centers (CGIAR), is the host institution for another of our students. His tasks will be to analyse the role of neglected and underutilized species (NUS) for climate change adaptation in agriculture and undertake mapping and modelling of the scope of using NUS for climate change adaptation. As Rio+20 is approaching and there is a need to tackle poverty and green growth head on, one of our students is currently working on the organisation of the World Green Summit, the business, finance, and government forum during Rio+20 with Green Media LTD.

Another of our students will help out an international environmental non-governmental organisation – WWF –  in the analysis of land-use changes in Doñana using satellite images. Development non-governmental organisations such as Tedeco (based at the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid) have long been helping the University of Ngozi in Burundi. One of the problems of this university is dealing with their electronic waste (e-waste). In order to shed light on the potential solutions to the e-waste management problem, one of our students is currently doing her internship focusing on the policies that could be implemented on-site given a resource constrained context and no previous e-waste management processes or strategies.

Other students will be involved in applied environmental research within the academic world. In this realm, one of our students is comparing European and Asian environmental regulations for one of our distinguished Professors (Joaquín Garralda) at IE; another student is analysing the evolving green economy and green growth concepts in the province of Ciudad Real (Spain) for the Complutense University in Spain. Further applied research is undertaken by another of our students in the field of water management and water governance at the Water Observatory (Botín Foundation). This student has joined a team of people working in an on-going project with Transparency International Spain that will analyse water rights and water budgetary allocations.

On a local scale, the Madrid City Council is currently preparing the 2013-2016 Plan for the Sustainable Use of Energy and Climate Change Prevention. The task of one of our students in this project is to undertake a comparative analysis of initiatives being developed worldwide in other cities to help Madrid step up the fight against climate change in its forthcoming plan. Networks of cities such as C40 or ICLEI are providing guidance on the existing initiatives. Given the economic crisis, one of the core criteria against which initiatives will be evaluated is cost efficiency, along with environmental effectiveness, equity, social acceptability and political feasibility. On the energy sector, another of our students is starting to get acquainted with the inner workings of the Health, Safety and Environment department of the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan Republic (SOCAR). 

As you can see we have links with a wide variety of local, national and international institutions, both public and private, that will provide most valuable work experience in the blooming field of environmental management. We are looking forward to the student presentations at the end of the internship period to see how their work can help advance environmental management!

The wetlands of Tablas de Daimiel and nearby crops

Last week, our group took a field trip to Parque Nacional de las Tablas de Daimiel, one of Spain’s national parks. Our mission was simple, to take a first-hand look at the state of the park’s wetlands. The national park is located about two hours south of Madrid in the region of La Mancha, an area known for its arid climate, manchego cheese and the famous Don Quixote. Although La Mancha has a fairly arid climate, it is home to Spain’s last remaining inland wetlands.

The wetlands were once fed by the nearby Guadiana River and groundwater discharges, but the growing demand for water from nearby agriculture has drastically affected the water supply. In 2009, after several years of droughts, water levels were so low that the wetlands began to dry out and smoke began to rise in some areas. Scientists found that the mud (also called peat) had begun to self-combust and was burning below ground, resulting in smoke arising from cracks in the mud. The only way the fires can be put out is by flooding the area with water. Fortunately, 2010 proved to be a very rainy year, the wetlands were once again flooded and water levels began to be restored. Yet, unless water use decreases, the problem of over exploitation of water will remain.

One the way to the Tablas de Daimiel, it is easy to see how important agriculture has become to this region. Although olives and grapes have long been grown here, more water-intensive crops like peppers and melons have become standard in the region. There are crops everywhere, right up to the edges of the national park. The resulting image is an ironic reminder of the conflict for water between nature and man. In the weeks to come, we will take a closer look at the situation as we hope to find a way to find balance between the water needs of a booming industry and the surrounding environment.

Jonathan Foley describes the impact of agriculture on the environment. Since we have to eat, how we can minimize the negative impacts of growing food?

Also, take a look at this recent news story.

Next year, the Master in Global Environmental Change will have a brand-new course on “Food Systems and Global Change”. We believe that understanding environmental change is impossible without understanding food production. You want to know why? Below are some recent media items on the global dimensions of food production and its impact on the environment.

Listen to “Food: The Hidden Driver of Global Politics“.

Read “Factory farms the only way to ‘feed the world’?“.

Last week, students and professors from the Master in Global Environmental Change went on an excursion to Picos de Europa, in the north of Spain. This is one of the most remarkable National Parks of Spain, with dramatically sculpted mountain landscapes, and a very interesting area to study the effects of global socio-economic and environmental changes on biodiversity and land use. What is unique about the Park is that several villages are located within its boundaries. The interaction between people and landscapes is crucial to conservation in Picos.

Diego Martin of The Bearded Vulture Foundation explains the challenges of ecosystem conservation in Picos de Europa

Land use in Picos de Europa has undergone rapid change over the last decades. Traditionally, people lived from sheep and goat holding. In the summer, shepherds would bring their animals to the summer pastures. Cheese production converted perishable milk into a storable product that could be eaten in winter, or sold.

In recent years, however, people have massively shifted from goats and sheep to cows, encouraged by European Union subsidies. Others have abandoned agriculture altogether. The remaining shepherds are struggling to keep their business going. As livestock grazes less, some pastures are slowly overtaken by young forests. This isn’t necessarily good news for biodiversity, though. Some species depend on human activities for their survival.

The Bearded Vulture is a case in point. This species feeds exclusively on the bones of sheeps and goats. As sheep and goat farming disappeared from the area, so did the Bearded Vulture, which became extinct in the 1960s in Picos de Europa. The Bearded Vulture Foundation, which we visited on the second day of the excursion, is working on the conservation of biodiversity in the region. This organization recently reintroduced the species to the area. To ensure that the vultures can find food, the Foundation started a project to support sheep farming. It connected local shepherds to restaurants in the area, to supply them with lamb meat. A local brand was created to add value to this product. This is a very interesting example of a project that combines environmental sustainability and local development.

The director of the park talked to us about the challenges of the administration to manage this park. The park deals with more than a million visitors per year, local, regional, and national authorities, villages within the park, and very complicated logistics due to the long distances of the mountain roads, which are frequently covered by snow. Professor Patricia Mateo demonstrated ecological field techniques, especially the monitoring of vultures. We got an impression of the challenges of scientific field work and biodiversity monitoring in a mountainous region. Obviously we did not forget to sample some of the excellent cheeses and ciders from the region.