Background
The ‘International Symposium on Managing Land and Water for Climate-Smart Agriculture’ aims to facilitate the exchange of information and knowledge among soil, water and environment professionals from developed and developing countries to advance the understanding, collaboration and capabilities to respond to the impact of climate change in a rapidly changing global environment. It will also draw on lessons learnt, current status, with a focus on new development of nuclear and isotopic techniques to enhance the resilience of livelihoods to threats and crises that impact agriculture and food security, such as emissions of greenhouse gases (GHGs), climate change and nuclear or radiological emergencies.
Objective
The objectives of the symposium are to:
- review recent development of nuclear, isotopic and related techniques to improve land and water management practices under changing climate and to minimize the impact of radiological emergences on crop production;
- provide information on the development of tools and technology packages to build soil resilience, adapt farming practices to the impact of climate change, as well as to nuclear or radiological emergencies; and
- identify knowledge gaps, research needs and new opportunities to develop climate-smart agricultural practices to build capacities and transfer of technologies to Member States.
Topics
The symposium will cover the following topics related to land and water management under climate change and radiological emergencies:
- Plant nutrition and nutrient cycling for enhancing crop productivity and on-farm ecosystem services.
- Soil conservation, land management minimizing soil erosion, land degradation, improving soil health, increasing biodiversity and crop production.
- Agricultural water management for improving water use efficiency, threats/impact to agricultural water quality.
- Climate change and greenhouse gas emissions.
- Tracing agricultural and industrial pollutants and assessing their threats to crop production and environmental sustainability.
- Advances of nuclear-based instrumental and analytical techniques applicable in soil and water research.
- Integrating nuclear techniques with other advanced techniques such as digital technology in agriculture, GIS, deep learning and modelling techniques.
