Seite - 3 - in options, Band winter 2020

1970 This artwork illustrates the main findings of the article, but does not intend to accurately represent its results (https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-020-2705-y) Credit: Adam Islaam | International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) 2010 2050 2100 Increased conservation efforts + more sustainable production + more sustainable consumption Historical Increased conservation efforts Business as usual FREE TRADE COULD STAVE OFF HUNGER ADVANCING FUTURE PREDICTIONS OF PLANT BEHAVIOR WHAT A COMMUNITY OF OPEN SCIENCE ENTAILS Easing trade barriers between countries could potentially prevent 53 million people from experiencing acute hunger, an international team of researchers has found. In the battle against climate change-induced hunger, free trade measures for food crops like wheat, corn, or rice can reduce the potential number of people exposed to undernourishment by 2050. Global food strategies must therefore go hand in hand with improvements to trade infrastructure. www.iiasa.ac.at/news/Hunger-20 Plants and vegetation are vital for life on Earth and the global carbon cycle, but their behaviors and impacts under future climate are complex and hard to predict. A new IIASA study shows how complex behaviors of plants and vegetation can be better understood and predicted based on underlying organizing principles: evolution, self- organization, and entropy maximization. This approach leads to more reliable vegetation models and improved tools to manage the biosphere for the future. www.iiasa.ac.at/news/Vegetationmodels-20 Open-source scientific software can pave the road for a community of open science. By following best practices of scientific software development, especially findable, accessible, interoperable, and reusable (FAIR) data, researchers can achieve more efficient research with well-structured code, explicit dependencies, continuous integration, tests, and good documentation. blog.iiasa.ac.at/Huppmann-20 News in brief Bending the curve of biodiversity loss Each time a plant or an animal goes extinct, our world unravels. For decades, human activity has pushed the Earth to the brink and shaped a future of steadily declining biodiversity. If we allow the current trend to continue, we will be rendering vibrant and bountiful species homeless, leading future generations to live on a lonely planet. We are the cause – but we could also be the solution. An IIASA study published in Nature and which forms part of the 2020 World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) Living Planet Report, suggests that without ambitious and integrated action combining biodiversity conservation and restoration efforts with food system transformation, turning the tide of biodiversity loss by 2050 or earlier will not be possible. The study uses multiple models to explore future pathways for reaching biodiversity targets. “We wanted to assess robustly whether it might be feasible to bend the curve of declining terrestrial biodiversity due to current and future land use while avoiding jeopardizing our chances to achieve other Sustainable Development Goals,” explains study lead author and IIASA researcher David Leclère. The study is optimistic that bending the curve of biodiversity loss from habitat conversion by 2050 is possible without jeopardizing food security. However, to achieve such a goal, researchers emphasize the necessity of a balanced synergy between biodiversity conservation, the restoration of degraded land, and a transformation of how we produce and consume food. Consequently, the study could materialize the 2050 vision of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity – “Living in harmony with nature”. Now is the time to divert from business as usual and to aspire to ambitious global biodiversity and climate mitigation targets. Never has a “New Deal for Nature and People” that halts and starts to reverse biodiversity loss, been needed more. Further info: pure.iiasa.ac.at/16699 David Leclere: leclere@iiasa.ac.at By Shorouk Elkobros 3Optionswww.iiasa.ac.at Winter 2020