A major five-day Forum on Science, Technology and Innovation for Sustainable Development will be held on 11-15 June 2012 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in the days just prior to the Rio+20 Conference. The Forum will bring together leading international scientists and policy-makers to explore the key role of interdisciplinary science and innovation in the transition to sustainable development, a green economy and poverty eradication. The aim is to help establish the research, technology and policy agendas that will be needed after Rio+20.

The Belmont Forum, recognizing the valuable contribution of the social sciences to the understanding of and response to global environmental change, invited the ISSC to represent the international social science community as a member of the forum in January of 2010. Shortly after joining the Forum, the need to bring together a global group of representatives of the disciplines embodied in the social sciences in order to critically reflect on the Belmont Forum White Paper, and identify ways to mobilize the broader social science communities to increase the production of social science research relevant to the Belmont Challenge and global environmental change more broadly.

The purpose of the forum was to explore the role of African universities in promoting education on climate change adaptation in the areas of research, curriculum development and teacher training, as well as to examine issues of how to more fully engage civil society on adaptation through education aimed outside the university.

The Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics (ICTP) is organizing an International Conference on the Coordinated Regional Climate Downscaling Experiment CORDEX to be held at ICTP, Trieste, Italy from 21 – 26 March 2011. CORDEX entails the completion and intercomparison of ensembles of different regional climate model (RCM) experiments using the same domains, resolution and lateral boundary condition fields from either analyses of observations or global climate models. The RCM simulations are then expected to be compared to analogous downscaling experiments with statistical/empirical techniques. Specific sets of analysis metrics for both, model validation and assessment of projections, are being developed for each region.

The workshop will address these risks and assess the vulnerability of Asian Coastal Cities to climate change. Co-organized by SEA-START and The East-West Center, and sponsored by APN, the workshop will be held from August 23rd to September 1st 2010 in Bangkok, Thailand.

Conference organizers are now accepting abstracts for paper presentations for the second international conference on Cities at Risk: Building Adaptive Capacities for Managing Climate Change Risks in Asian Coastal Cities (CAR II). The conference, to be held 11-13 April 2011 in Taipei, Chinese Taipei, is part of the ongoing multi-year effort titled Cities at Risk(CAR), which aims to reduce risks and vulnerabilities of Asian coastal cities brought on by climate change and urban growth.

The 2012 International Planet Under Pressure conference will provide a comprehensive update of the pressure planet Earth is now under. The conference will discuss solutions at all scales to move societies on to a sustainable pathway. It will provide scientific leadership towards the 2012 UN Conference on Sustainable Development – Rio+20.

The International Council for Science (ICSU) is spearheading a consultation process in cooperation with the International Social Science Council (ISSC) to engage the scientific community to explore options and propose implementation steps for a holistic strategy on Earth system research. The overarching goal of the visioning process is: to engage the scientific community to explore options and propose steps to implement a holistic strategy for Earth system research. This strategy will both encourage scientific innovation and address policy needs.

The International Bureau provides financial support to German universities, research institutes and small and medium-sized enterprises for cooperation in science and research with partners from selected countries and for work in particular scientific and technical fields. This support is intended to help fund exploratory activities and the preparation of projects. Feasibility studies and pilot investigations may be funded as well. Applicants for funding should take note of country-specific thematic orientations and specific funding initiatives.