Sussex Sustainability Research Programme

Sussex Sustainability Research Programme Symposium 2024

• Video transcript

  Light pop music.

  Footage of people at the SSRP symposium.

  Title screen of text: “SSRP Symposium 2024”

  Prof Joesph Alcamo:

  “The SSP is a program of the University of Sussex, and it's all about research for sustainability and research to support the Sustainable Development Goals. We're working with partners throughout the world in more than global South countries and the UK, and we're working with them on projects that combine environmental sustainability and research to improve human wellbeing.”

  On screen text: The world is facing huge challenges, from river pollution to deforestation – and global climate change.

  On screen text: SSRP researchers are tackling these problems and changing the world for the better.”

  On screen text: At our recent Symposium, some of our brilliant researchers told us more about their vital sustainability projects across three key themes: Theme 1 Ecosystems, Rights and Justice.

  Prof Fiona Matthews:

  “What I'm going to be talking about today is our work trying to find solutions for deforestation, specifically in the Andes. This area has some of the highest deforestation rates on the planet. Most of deforestation is actually driven by small scale farmers just simply trying to make a living. So what we're doing is we're working really closely with in-country partners, both at the university and a charity, to try to find sustainable futures for both the people and also the landscape that they occupy and therefore the habitat that the wildlife needs in this incredible biodiversity hotspot.”

  Prof Mika Peck:

  “We've been working in Ecuador for the last couple of years with funding from SSRP, Hive, University of Sussex to set up a new organization called Eco Forensics, dedicated to working out how we can basically represent nature in the court system. So we're training local communities to collect data and then build cases to protect their territories. The latest developments in our research, we're just at the stage now where we're collating the ecological information and building the case with local lawyers to represent nature in these communities. We're also then providing a new framework to the Ecuadorian government to update their environmental impact assessment process. So I think that next year is going to be a very interesting time. We'll see, are we successful, does this work?

  On screen text: Theme 2: South Coast sustainability and sustainability frontiers.

  Dr Lucila Newell:

  “Today I'm going to present our project called Ripple Effect, a citizen science project that engages and trains volunteers to monitor water quality and biodiversity in the upper River Medway. The latest developments are that the water quality is unfortunately not good. It's not healthy, parameters are over healthy limits and this is worse near sewage outlets. Not surprising, but we have the data to back it up now, which we didn't. And that's very powerful.

  Dr Valentina Scarponi:

  “Today I'm going to be presenting a really exciting look into what's been going on with our fish invertebrate community along the Sussex coast. We are monitoring how the community is changing after the removal of a very destructive fishing practice. Since 2021 we've been going back every single year. Our work here is not done by any means, and so it is up to us to keep monitoring all of the changes in order to understand what the new, healthy ecosystem is going to look like. Now, there's no more trawling allowed. SSP has supported our research just to fund part of the eDNA analysis that we have conducted along the Sussex coast in 2023. So we were really grateful.

  On screen text: Theme 3 Sustainable climate and food systems.

  On screen text: Dr Shova Thapa Karki (Business School), SSRP fellow, is researching the role of local, place-based knowledge in food production and consumption.

  On screen text: Dr Abdul Abbas (Business School), SSRP fellow, is including local people in research and innovation policy for climate change and sustainability in Northern Nigeria.

  On screen text: Dr Pedram Rowhani (Global Studies), SSRP fellow, works on implementing and improving early warning systems for extreme drought in the Greater Horn of Africa.

  On screen text: Dr Mirela Barbu (Business School), SSRP fellow, collaborates with a Syrian NGO to work towards sustainable agriculture in post-conflict zones in Northwest Syria.

  Prof Joesph Alcamo:

  “We believe that it's collective action that's the way to go. To protect the planet and to improve human well-being. And we were absolutely convinced that research and science can make a very important contribution to this collective action. And that's what the SSRP is all about.”

  On screen graphic: University of Sussex logo