Infomail 01/01

Welcome to the first edition of SERI's InfoMail in 2001.

The monthly published electronic news bulletin of the Vienna
Sustainable Europe Research Institute (SERI).

 

Table of contents

2. Project-Overview: News from our projects, our other work and new research fields

3. Friends: Seri and ... (News about co-operation and partnerships)

4. Selected publications: Book reviews and announcements from SERI members and related writers and publishers

5. Links + Other: News about other activities, hints and advice on dates, workshops etc.

6. Going on in Vienna

Contents

1. SERI-News: General news from SERI and SERI members

SERI became a member of ESTO
The Executive Committee of the European Science and Technology Observatory has agreed on welcoming SERI as a new Associated Member of ESTO (see http://esto.jrc.es).

Fritz Hinterberger in the Who is Who

Fritz Hinterberger has been included in recent edition of "Who 's Who in Science and Engeneering" by Marquis Who's Who, USA.

Daniel Mittler at the high level workshop on Globalisation

Daniel Mittler participated in a high level workshop on Globalisation held in Berlin at the Deutsche Gesellschaft f�r Ausw�rtige Politik. His paper: "Lokal denken, global handeln? Anmerkungen zur Globalisierung" can be viewed on his website.

OECD Expert Workshop on Sustainable Consumption

Sylvia Lorek and Julia Haake participated in the OECD Expert Workshop on Information and Consumer Decision Making for Sustainable Consumption.
Experts from NGO's, industry and research organisations discussed with delegates from 20 OECD countries about the possibilities and constraints of public information campaigns to achieve more sustainable consumption patterns. Several successful examples of private (organised) - public (financed) campaigns were presented. But there was a broad consence that the public task is mainly to set the right framework of taxes, subsidies and other incentives rather than telling the people how to behave in a right way.

Fore detailed information please contact Sylvia Lorek

PROSUS/CSTM workshop on sustainable household consumption

On the 17-19 of November 2000, Francois Schneider and Sylvia Lorek attended to the Prosus/CSTM workshop on sustainable household consumption held at the University of Twente(NL), discussing possible future themes of research.

To structure the research issue "Globalization and Sustainable Consumption" Sylvia Lorek and Doris Fuchs (CSTM) presented a report. The paper is available here.

More information on this workshop you can get by clicking here.

 

2. Project-Overview: News from our projects, our other work and new research fields

MIPS Internet & Learning Platform

SERI (Roman Mesicek) is at the moment preparing scientific input for an internet & learning platform on the topic Dematerialization and MIPS (Material Input per Service Unit).

The project is conducted by the Society Factor 4+ in the context of an European project on multi-media-teaching, and co-ordinated by Christopher Manstein, SERI director on the topic Sustainable Production and the same time dep. managing director of Society Factor 4+. The interactive learning space will be used for further information and education of the workshop participants.

The final version of the platform will be made available as a website on www.faktor4plus.at

Theme of the Month on www.nachhaltigkeit.at: Europe and Sustainability.

SERI is providing the "theme of the month" (February 2001) for the website www.nachhaltigkeit.at. The topic is "Europe and Sustainability" (in German only).

The website will feature facts about the Environmental Action Programme, the Integration-Process and the upcoming Sustainability Strategy of the EU and Austria, among others. You'll also find positions and comments by involved parties such as the Austrian government and the Friends of the Earth Europe.

3. Friends: Seri and ... (News about co-operation and partnerships)

SERI supports Sustainability.TV

This new website is dedicated in bringing content on the topic Sustainable Development on the web. They will provide live web-broadcasts from interesting events, archive video and audio clips of interesting speeches and also have a list with links to further media resources on the web. SERI supports this undertaking scientifically.

Sustainability.TV will broadcast some of our internal and external events as well as support large (EU-) projects. The first two videos feature Mathis Wackernagel's speech at the elephant house of the Vienna zoo on the Ecological Footprint (organised by SERI and the �kosoziales Forum Wien in the course of our Sustainable Europe lecture series) and Arnim Wieck on "Produktbezogene Fl�chenintensit�t" from our last internal workshop.

Click www.sustainability.tv for details.

SERI would still like to invite post-doc researchers intending to apply for Marie Curie Fellowships to work with SERI or members of the SERI network in other parts of Europe.

See www.cordis.lu/improving/src/hp_mcf.htm for more, or try the links below for detailed information:

http://www.cordis.lu/improving/src/hp_ncp.htm
http://www.cordis.lu/improving/src/mc_tsf_pg.htm
http://improving-mcf.sti.jrc.it/project/
http://www.mariecurie.org/
http://www.cordis.lu/tmr/src/grants1.htm

But we are also looking for interesting places of research to which our researchers could go for some time!

4. Selected publications: Book reviews and announcements from SERI members and related writers and publishers

New publication by Daniel MITTLER:

"How insensitive are urbanites? A view from Edinburgh". Published in: Friends of Nature, Resurgence, No. 201, January/February 2001, p. 26-29.

Daniel Mittler published a polemic in favour of cities and against the anti-politicial reification of nature in the recent edition of the Resurgence magazine. The article can be downloaded from his website.

To visit the "spiritual flagship of the green movement" (The Guardian) please click: www.resurgence.org.

5. Links + Other: News about other activities, hints and advice on dates, workshops etc.

French government supports post-doc researchers

Le Ministere de la recherche lance un appel d'offres pour l'accueil en France de jeunes chercheurs etrangers en sejour de recherche post-doctorale. Date limite de candidature: 28 fevrier 2001. Click here for detailed information.

The Centre d'Economie et d'Ethique pour l'Environnement et le D�veloppement (C3ED) for example is such a possible institution. See here for more.

Workshop announcement:

"Alternative Economies in the 21. Century"
02. - 04. M�rz 2001, W�rzburg/Germany

Consequences from the UNEP study "Global Environmental Outlook - GEO 2000" will be discussed on a workshop in W�rzburg (Akademie Frankenwarte) from 02.-04.03.2001 (in German). The workshop is organized by the Theory Task Force for an Alternative Economy and the Friedrich Ebert Stiftung. Speakers are - among others - Stefan Summerer, UBA; Christa M�ller, anstiftung and Elmar Sing, �KONSULT.

The participation fee is DM 120,-

For further Infos please contact Brigitte Nanke-Mann, ++49 (0)931/8046427 or send a mail to [email protected].

Announcement for the IGBP/WCRP/IHDP Joint Conference

A Global Change Open Science Conference:
"Challanges of a changing earth"
July 10 - 13, 2001, Amsterdam/Netherlands

The Earth's environment and habitability are now, as never before, affected by human activities. This conference will present the latest scientific understanding of natural and human-driven changes on our planet. It will examine the effects on our societies and lives, and explore what the future may hold.

The Conference will be aimed towards the global change scientific community, both specialists in disciplinary areas of global change research and the broader community. A special effort is being made to attract and support scientists from developing countries, Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union; and post-doctoral researchers and graduate students.

For details on this conference and for participation please click here.

Announcement for the ENCORE 2001

5th Environment Conference of the Regions of Europe
September 27 - 28, 2001 / Villach, Carinthia, Austria

SERI helped to prepare this conference with the paper "Eco-efficiency of regions". You'll find this paper for download at www.seri.at/regions.

Please find details on the conference at www.encore2001.at.

Announcement for the

3rd International Congress on Environmental Indices and Indicators:
Systems Analysis Approach INDEX2001: Quality of Life Indicators
October 2-5, 2001, Rome, Italy

The key role of Quality-of-Life Indicators in measuring progress towards sustainable development has been defined as an integral element of the Action Plan known as Agenda 21, the major achievements of the UNCED-Conference in Rio de Janeiro (Earth Summit) in 1992: "Countries, with the assistance of International Organisations, where required, should (.) develop, apply and institute the necessary tools for sustainable development with regard to (.) Quality - of - Life indicators covering, for example, health, education, social welfare, state of the environment, and the economy"(Chapter 35).

The Objectives of INDEX2001 Congress are:

For more and detailed information please surf to the conference website or send an E-Mail to: [email protected]

Plenary themes of the meeting will address the challenges of integration in human dimensions research - across disciplines, across hemispheres, and across the science-policy interface. They will also address issues of central importance to both the developed and the developing world - "urban sustainability", "vulnerability", and "poverty and the environment". One plenary talk will discuss the climate change issue in the post-Kyoto era and the implications for human dimensions research. In addition to plenary talks, there will be a large number of sessions devoted to the presentation of research on the human dimensions of global environmental change, including topics such as land use and land cover change, energy, environmental security, industrial transformation, sustainable development, integrated assessment, population and the environment, environment and health, attitudes and behaviour, consumption, trade and the environment, environmental governance, environmental and ecological economics, and the science-policy interface.

For participation details click here or mail your inquiries to [email protected]

6. Going on in Vienna

The SERI brownbag seminar

In a loose series of lectures, to which we invite all interested guests, we want to discuss our own work and that of our colleagues. Please bring your own lunch bag! If you can't attend: From now on, brownbag seminars will be broadcasted live on the internet.

Forthcoming seminar:
"GLOBAL MATERIAL FLOWS"
Location: SERIs office in Vienna.
Date and time: February 5th 2001, 2-6 pm

In this brownbag seminar, we will discuss how material flow accounting and analysis could be linked to global economic input-output-models. We will shortly present the COMPASS model for world trade relations, developed at the University of Osnabr�ck (see here for details) and discuss how the calculation of indirect material flows (or ecological rucksacks) could be facilitated by linking material flow data to this kind of macro economic models.

We will also outline further research activities in the field of global material flow analysis (see www.seri.at/globalisation) and ecologically unequal exchange (see here).

The seminar will be transmitted LIVE via internet at www.sustainability.tv

For details and further questions contact: Stefan Giljum

Visit of the EU Commissioner for the Enviroment in Vienna

In relation to the topic of the month "Europe and Sustainability" on www.nachhaltigkeit.at we would like to make you aware of the visit of Ms. Margot Wallstr�m, the Commissioner for the Enviroment, who will take part in the symposium "Nachhaltig in die Zukunft? - Auf dem Weg zur EU-Nachhaltigkeitsstrategie" on the 15th of February 2001 in Vienna.

Visit this website for details. This event will be broadcasted live on the internet by www.sustainability.tv.

See also: "Theme of the Month on www.nachhaltigkeit.at: Europe and Sustainability" in the Project-Overview category above.

 

These were our messages and news for this month. Please don’t hesitate to contact us for detailed information on our projects and for possibilities in co-operation and partnership. It’s a challenge to start an interactive dialogue of exchanging experiences. You are all invited to participate in this process.

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SERI is the first "virtual" research institute with associated researchers all over Europe.

The Sustainable Europe Research Institute, together with a supporting legal association, exists since September 1999 according to Austrian Law. The headquarters have been established in Vienna. We would like to invite you to participate in this undertaking.

The Sustainable Europe Research Institute (SERI) is a Pan-European think tank aiming to explore sustainable development options for European societies. SERI's research agenda and methodology is based on previous work carried out by Friends of the Earth and the Wuppertal Institute. The Institute aims to develop the concept of environmental space and shows ways to substantially reduce the resource throughput of modern industrial societies. The research carried out by members of SERI supports the dialogue within European civil society. It specifically aims to further develop the exchange of ideas between environmental citizens organisations, governments, trade unions and industry. The scientific dialogue SERI aims to engender is supported by its web page and this newsletter, conferences, meetings as well as publications.

Have a nice day – your SERI-Team.

SERI-Infomail 01/2001
Distributed by Jürgen Schäfer
Managing Editor, SERI-InfoMail
All Rights Reserved.
© SERI 2001 (Vienna / Essen)