How can we provide food to humanity while sustaining animal well-being and biodiversity ?

The animal well being can not be set aside in favor of human well being. Both are interconnected and interdependent. Livestock farming today is awful and does not seem to improve. The same remarks can also address the agricultural field. If we can establish a parallel between biodiversity and humanity qualities and living conditions, what will the future look like ?

Given the predominant theme:”to take action against global environmental change”, and the fact that environmental change is an ongoing process with long term consequences, what is being done in terms of research to find solutions leading to adaptation as well as mitigation of the effects on the earth and humanity to these changes?

Negative environmental change is widely perceived and agreed upon by most scientific and policy formulation circles. Too much effort is going into how to stop it, rather than how to adapt to it, for it is now inevitable and beyond the immediate control of humanity, therefore adaptation must take precedence over, or at the very least run parallel to mitigation, in order to ensure long term solutions for the earth and humanity.

How should we identify vulnerable potable water supplies and estimate the cost of adapting these supplies to 2050-2100 ecosystem-level climates?

Availabile potable water is required for human survival. Many supplies around the world are already threatened, and climate change is adding to water-stress. Potable water supplies are a major driver for migration in the developing world.

How do we meet the human wellbeing requirements (e.g. food and nutritional security, health, livelihoods) of current and future human populations without increasing pressure on already vulnerable ecosystems?

Increasing evidence suggests that demands on food production are likely to reach a peak mid-century. At the same time, our ability to produce and transport sufficient food is predicted to be reduced by climate change (temperature and water dynamics), carbon costs (chemicals, transport), and the loss of land to energy production.

There will therefore be increasing pressure on:
• natural resources (land and associated water and soil, biodiversity), leading to trade-offs for ecosystem service provisioning (with impacts on livelihoods, ecosystem and human health, security) and other land uses (agriculture, biofuels, urban planning, conservation, recreation)
• agricultural practice leading for the need for new and innovative techniques and technologies, and the concomitant risks for environmental and human health

To stand a chance of tackling these inter-related issues, mechanisms and funding for regional and global projects that move beyond assessment are required. Projects should be interdisciplinary and participatory incorporating researchers, practitioners and the people whose wellbeing is under investigation. Such work should not only allow conceptual and theoretical development in the fields of environmental and sustainability science but must also have impact on the ground, creating opportunities for improved human wellbeing and increased resilience not just for now, but into the future also.

What is the best fit trajectory of development to balance economic growth, natural resource use and low carbon emission in the less developed and emerging economies of Africa, Asia, and Latin America?

To increase economic growth and reduce the number of the poor, the low income and emerging economies of Africa, Asia and Latin Ameria are going to strive more vigorously to achieve higher economic growth in the coming decade. This implies that they are going to explore every resources (importantly, natural resources)to do this. It is clear now, judging from current levels of knowledge on the state of the earth, these contries must not follow the development trajectory of todays’ developed nations, otherwise the planet earth (and all of us) will be in greater jeopardy in future. It is critically important now to ponder on what is the optimum developmenent trajectory that should be followed to balance sustainable use of natural resources, achieve low carbon economy, and record the levels of economic growth that can take majority of population out of poverty, in a win-win fashion. Specific country level (and local level)investigations using cross discipline methodologies may be required. It may also require radical spatial/land use re-organization which may be in conflict with existing social organization.

What are the consequences of ground water reduction on agriculture?

I asked this question and I am concerned that population is growing therefor its food demand and more agriculture productivity means somehow losing soil strength and soil water (soil productivity). This may affect climate regionally. How to address such problem in next decade. If human want to survive than we have to address such question in next decade first rather than discussing water cycle and global warming as they are seems to be periodic.

Do endogenous pollutants modify human nuclear receptors (other than the well documented oestrogen modulation)?

As nuclear receptors make a switch (eg lipids on/off, energy conversation on/off) and the receptor ligands are small lipophilic molecules that can cause ligand-specific and tissue specific changes (a nightmare, or an opportunity, for a quantitative pharmacologist) – how can we be sure that the epidemic of obesity is not partly due to endogenous lipophilic (e.g.PPAR) common pollutant modulators that switch metabolism, rather than just eating fast food and not exercising, although this undeniably contributes. There are more than 300 compounds in our bodies now compared with prior to the industrial environment.

Pr Michael Spedding,
Chairman NC-IUPHAR,
Experimental Sciences
Institute of Research Servier
11 Rue des Moulineaux
92150 Suresnes
France
michael.spedding@fr.netgrs.com

Can equitable access to ecosystem services be reached for the inhabitants of Earth within one decade?

All assessments indicate that the biological carrying capacity of the planet goes up to 9 billion people and more – but the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment has demonstrated that access to ecosystem services is not improving for many people. Reasons cited are social, economic and ecological.

Does global warming bring more rain or less rain, and how the rainfall pattern is changed around the globe?

water is one of the most important resources affecting people’s lives. We need to know how global warming changes the pattern of the rainfall, so the policy makers and governments can plan and implement policies that can mitigate severe problems such as drought or flooding, and infrastructure to distribute water effectively.

How can the perceived imperative in market-economies for continuous open-ended economic growth, be reconciled with the need from a natural science perspective for the collective human impact on the biophysical Earth system to be stabilized or decreased in order to sustain human well-being indefinitely?

The conflict between economic and natural science perspectives addressed by this question is the ultimate driver behind the biophysical Earth System issues that are of concern and have led to the emergence of the idea of Earth System Science. Over the coming decade we can confidently expect socio-economic aspects to become much more strongly expressed in Earth System models. The reason that we expect ESS to attract community support is that we think it will help formulation of relevant actions & policies to address the ES issues. Unless the conflict between the socio-economic drivers of national and international policy can be reconciled with biophysical (environmental) drivers of policy, solutions to earth system probems at the whole-system level are doomed to failure. It will take a long time for the two world views to become reconciled into a single workable approach. So the sooner ESS starts addressing the issue the better.