Swiss Academies of Arts and Sciences
Neonicotinoids and their substitutes in sustainable pest control
The EU must close loopholes to prevent the 2018 ban on the three main neonicotinoids from being further undermined, according to a new report by European Academies.
Neonicotinoids, a class of insecticides, indiscriminately affect pollinators and other beneficial insects, thereby threatening biodiversity and longer-term food security. The scientific report commends the EU’s Integrated Pest Management as the primary route to sustainable agriculture, that included banning three neonicotinoids. Yet it identifies loopholes in its implementation: studies that show that seven out of ten honey samples in the EU still contain traces of at least one of the bee-toxic pesticides. “It is counterproductive to kill everything, since once the pest adapts to the pesticide, there may be no natural enemies remaining, let alone essential pollinators. It is a similar problem to that we are seeing with the wide use of antibiotics,” comments Edward Mitchell of the University of Neuchâtel, who had contributed to the new report as delegate of the Swiss Academies of Arts and Sciences.
Swiss Academy of Sciences SCNAT
Roles of Scientists in Sustainability Transformations: A Guide for Reflection and Workshop Facilitation
Scientists, scientific experts, and knowledge brokers often find themselves in situations where they need to play new roles in society or are criticised for positioning themselves at the interface between science and other societal fields of action. The present guide aims to stimulate reflections on, and discussions of, various different roles that scientists perform.
European Academies Science Advisory Council EASAC
Changing wildfires: policy options for a fire-literate and fire-adapted Europe
There is an increased probability of extreme fires, due mainly to climate change (droughts and declining summer precipitation), rural depopulation, and land-use changes. To respond to this, a new European Academies report is calling for an urgent shift in wildfire policy – from reactive fire suppression to proactive, risk-based land management.
Already today, wildfires burn half a million hectares in the EU yearly on average, i.e. nearly twice the size of Luxembourg. While the Mediterranean remains the highest-risk region, the report warns that continental, alpine, and boreal regions must also prepare for a new era of fire. Instead of focussing on fire suppression and emergency response, the report advocates for an integrated EU framework for landscape fire-risk governance that prioritises prevention alongside these three elements: climate and land-use policies that focus on restoring carbon-rich peatlands and managing forests sustainably; integrate fire risk into biodiversity and tree-planting plans; and educate for a fire-resilient society.
The report under the auspices of the European Academies Science Advisory Council (EASAC) was drafted by scientists from across Europe. On behalf of the Swiss Academies of Arts and Sciences, Marco Conedera, forest engineer at the WSL Campus in Cadenazzo, contributed as a reviewer of a draft version.
Actor constellation - td-net toolbox profile 2 Pohl, C. 2020
This publication describes the actor constellation and is part of a series of tools and methods compiled in the td-net toolbox for co-producing knowledge. Actor constellation is a role-play for identifying the relevance of various involved actors for tackling a specific research question.