Paris, 13 September 2010


EFITA newsletter / 478 - European Federation for Information Technology in Agriculture, Food and the Environment


To read this newsletter on the efita.net web site...
See: http://www.efita.net?d=6801


South-west of France: Europe is fantastic…
Voir : http://grandsites.midipyrenees.fr:80/grands-sites-midi-pyrenees.php?extLang=fr&dL=leFilmGs


Conference Geoinformation + Farm Management + Agribusiness (GeoFarMA 2010)
 24 November (14h) - 26 November (14h) - Cologne (DE)
This confrence will gather the European specialists of geographic Information Systems, Electronic Date Interchange, uses of information technologies in Agriculture.
This conference is organised by "Conference on Agricultural Policy Implementation and Geo Information" (CAPIGI) and the teams of the EU R&D projects FutureFarm et agriXchange :
. CAPIGI (http://capigi.portolis.nl/)
. Future Farm (http://www.futurefarm.eu/)
. ad agriXchange (http://www.agrixchange.eu)
Contact : Sjaak WOLFERT
Mél : sjaak.wolfert(a)wur.nl


Grant Opportunity for Winter School on "Designing and Exploiting Certified Competence-based VET Curricula in Agriculture, Food & Environment"
28 February – 5 March - ATHENS
The winter school will take place in Athens, Greece from 28 February to 05 March 2011. This course aims to enhance trainees' understanding of the concepts of skills and competences; their appreciation of how competence models, when supported by IT tools, can improve the opportunities of vocational education and training curricula design and development; and their knowledge of how this can work in practice.
The participants can apply for funding since the program is approved by the Grundtvig Program of the European Commission
See: http://88.198.194.115/~agroknow/ecotool/schools/2010-winter-school-for-teachers/
Contact: Assistant Prof. Cleo SGOUROPOULOU
E-mail: csgouro(a)teiath.gr


Spatial Statistics 2011: Mapping Global Change
23 - 25 March 2011, University of Twente, ENSCHEDE - The Netherlands
The Spatial Statistics 2011 conference focuses on the role that spatial and spatio-temporal statistics plays in mapping global change. The goal is to bring together experts and interested people from academia, research institutes, and industry. The main conference themes are:
 
- Mapping global change
- Spatial and spatio-temporal statistical methodology
- Environmental issues
- Ecological and habitat changes
- Health and epidemiology
- Economy and energy
- Image use and analysis
- Developing countries

>>> Call for Papers
Oral and poster abstracts are now invited on the following topics and should be submitted using the online abstract submission system. Abstract submission deadline: 21 September 2010

>>> Topics for submission:
- Spatio-temporal statistics in image analysis and remote sensing
- Spatio-temporal statistics for modeling in Geographic Information Systems
- Spatial statistical modelling of global processes
- Environmental and ecological statistics
- Quantifying spatial economy and social factors
- Data quality and the communication of uncertainty in space and time
- Extremes and outliers in global change monitoring
- Spatio-temporal statistics to measure effects in developing countries
- Open source software for mapping and modelling global change
See: http://www.spatialstatisticsconference.com


USA: A Service of the Southeast Climate Consortium
AgroClimate is an interactive website with climate, agriculture, and forestry information that allows users to assess resource management options with respect to their probable outcomes under forecast climate conditions. AgroClimate uses crop simulation models along with historic and forecast climate data to allow decision makers to compare changes in probable outcomes under different climate conditions.
See: http://www.agroclimate.org


Climate Change Basics for the Southeast USA
To summarize, the climate of the Southeast is likely to change in the next decades. While the extent of these changes is subject of intense debate, we need to prepare for the challenges posed by climate change by becoming a more efficient society, reducing greenhouse gas emissions, identifying vulnerable sectors of society, and developing adaptation strategies.
See: http://agroclimate.org/climate_change/


Invitation to contribute to the CGIAR/ESSP CCAFS crop modelling initiative
The Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) and Earth Systems Science Partnership (ESSP) invites you to participate in a survey of crop modelling and climate change and food security.
The survey is being conducted by the CGIAR/ESSP Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security Challenge Programme (CCAFS). CCAFS is a major collaborative endeavour between the CGIAR and ESSP research communities, and their respective partners. Research over a ten-year period is aimed at:
- Overcoming the additional threats posed by a changing climate to achieving food security
- Enhancing livelihoods
- Improving environmental management in the developing world.

CCAFS is seeking the views of a wide range of stakeholders on how crop models can be improved for addressing these objectives.
To access the survey please use the following link:
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/crop_models_and_climate_change

Please complete the survey as soon as possible. Responses before the end of September 2010 will be very much appreciated.

Please feel free to distribute this invitation email to your colleagues. We aim to capture as wide a range of responses as possible.

We welcome views from model developers, users, funding agencies and anyone else involved in the use of crop models.

The aim of the survey is to compile as comprehensive a database as possible of crop models around the world, along with your views on issues of how the models can be improved for climate change and food security research. The information will be used to identify areas of strength and suggest how resources can be targeted to improve models and fill gaps in capabilities in the coming few years.

A report will be produced for CCAFS, and this will also be an input to the Agricultural Modelling Intercomparison and Improvement Project (AgMIP). This is a distributed climate simulation exercise for historical model intercomparison and future climate change conditions with the participation of multiple crop and world agricultural trade modelling groups around the world. The goals of AgMIP are to improve substantially the characterization of risk of hunger and world food security due to climate change and to enhance adaptation capacity in both developing and developed countries. AgMIP will place regional changes in agricultural production in a global context that reflects new trading opportunities, imbalances, and shortages in world markets resulting from climate change and other driving forces for food supply.
The survey is being conducted in collaboration between CCAFS, the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) and the Macaulay Land Use Research Institute (MLURI).
See: http://www.ccafs.cgiar.org/
For ESSP see: http://www.essp.org/
For CGIAR see: http://www.cgiar.org/
Questions regarding this survey and how the information will be used can be gained from:
Philip Thornton (International Livestock Research Institute, http://www.ilri.org/).
E-mail: p.thornton(a)cgiar.org


Joys of men v. women: The Silent Treatment
A man and his wife were having some problems at home and were giving each other the silent treatment.

Suddenly, the man realized that the next day, he would need his wife to wake him at 5:00 AM for an early morning business flight.

Not wanting to be the first to break the silence (and LOSE), he wrote on a piece of paper, 'Please wake me at 5:00 AM.' He left it where he knew she would find it.

The next morning, the man woke up, only to discover it was 9:00 AM and he had missed his flight Furious, he was about to go and see why his wife hadn't wakened him, when he noticed a piece of paper by the bed.

The paper said, 'It is 5:00 AM. Wake up.'

Men are not equipped for these kinds of contests.


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