Sustainability Science Dialogue + Opening event of the UniFR_ESH Institute

Date:  18 november 2021

Place: University of Fribourg, building PER21, room A120

Host: University of Fribourg Environmental Sciences and Humanities Institute

Event: Workshop / Opening event / Apéro

Registration open here!

Workshop: Sustainability Science Dialogue

The UN's 2030 Agenda includes 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Switzerland is currently not on course to achieve them. How can science contribute to accelerating the necessary transformation?

The Swiss Academy of Sciences (SCNAT) has outlined the most urgent need for research on the basis of six priority topics: i) food for people and planet, ii) thriving spaces: sustainability and spatial development, iii) net-zero greenhouse gas emissions society, iv) economic and financial systems for well-being, v) shared values, visions and pathways, and vi) dealing with synergies, trade-offs, and common threds.

In order to address these research needs, this event will highlight the topics to which the University of Fribourg can contribute, the open questions it intends to address and the new partnerships that would be promising in this regard.

This event invites researchers and teachers of the University of Fribourg as well as other interested parties to reflect together on the following questions:

  1. Which aspects of the priorities identified by the Academies are already being researched at the University of Fribourg? In which areas does it contribute to the priority topics?
  2. What are the main gaps and unresolved issues? How, by whom and in which partnerships could they be addressed?
  3. How can research and teaching on these issues be institutionalised at the University of Fribourg, what institutional requirements are needed for this and what role can the Environmental Sciences and Humanities Institute play in this?

The event is part of SCNAT's "Sustainability Science Dialogues" series.

 

Organizers:

UniFR_ESH Institute : Ivo Wallimann-Helmer, Matthias Eggel, Hanna Schübel; environment[at]unifr.ch 

SCNAT: Gabriela Wülser, Anja Bretzle

Programme

15h30 Welcome (Prof. Ivo Wallimann-Helmer, director, University of Fribourg Environmental Sciences and Humanities Institute)
15h40 Keynote: Priority Themes for Swiss Sustainability Research (Peter Edwards, president of the Sustainability Research Initiative)
16h00 Workshops: Discussion of the questions a) and b) in the context of the priority themes
17h15 Break
17h30 Compilation of the results of the individual groups and discussion: What is needed at the University of Fribourg to institutionalise sustainability in research and teaching?
18h15 Opening of the UniFR_ESH Institute (with Rector Prof Astrid Epiney and Prof Olivier Graefe)
18h45 Apéro
Opening event of the UniFR_ESH Institute from 6:15pm
Event series Sustainability Science Dialogue SCNAT