IPSI Welcomes Five New Members

We are pleased to announce that at its meeting in August 2015, the IPSI Steering Committee confirmed five new member organizations, bringing IPSI's total membership to 172 organizations. It is therefore our pleasure to welcome:

• NGO "Bureau for Regional Outreach Campaigns - BROC" (Russia)

• Association of Forest and Hunting Workers of Serbia – Forest and Hunting (Serbia)

• Center for Biodiversity and Conservation, American Museum of Natural History (USA)

• Higher Polytechnic School (EPS) - University of Santiago de Compostela (Spain)

• Organization for Community Development (OCD) (Pakistan)

The new members, in addition to being involved in valuable projects in their own right, also help to increase IPSI’s presence by expanding our membership in Europe and North America - two regions that have been less represented - while strengthening partnership in the more represented Asian region. We look forward to collaborating closely with all of them in promoting the concept of the Satoyama Initiative in the future.

Video: "Green Economies"

Our friends at IPSI member organization the Applied Environmental Research Foundation (AERF) in India recently shared a video they produced about their work in the Northwestern Ghats region of India. The video contains a lot of perspectives relevant to the Satoyama Initiative, including sustainable use and a landscape approach, and is recommended as an excellent example of some of the good work being done by IPSI partners.

We hope you will take ten minutes of your time to watch the video here.

Article on Biocultural Diversity

An article by the IPSI Secretariat's Mr. William Dunbar was recently posted on the blog The Nature of Cities that touches on a number of subjects relevant to the Satoyama Initiative and IPSI. The article, titled "Biocultural Diversity and the Diverse City: A Model for Linking Nature and Culture", focuses on the recent International Symposium on Biocultural Diversity held in Kanazawa, Japan by UNU-IAS OUIK, as well as efforts by the UNESCO-SCBD Joint Programme on Linking Cultural and Biological Diversity, UNESCO's Creative Cities Network, and the Satoyama Initiative in general.

The article can be found on The Nature of Cities here.

Article on Urato Islands Recovery

An article was recently published in the International Association for Ecology (INTECOL)'s e-Bulletin titled "Bouncing Back from Disaster in Urato Islands, Miyagi Pref., Japan", co-authored by the IPSI Secretariat's Mr. Yohsuke Amano and Mr. Kazuhiko Seriu, along with Tohoku University's Dr. Masakado Kawata. The article describes efforts towards recovery from the 2011 earthquake and tsunami in the Urato Islands in northeastern Japan, in line with the concept of the Satoyama Initiative. IPSI members have been closely involved with many restoration efforts, including through acollaborative activity involving UNU-IAS, Tohoku University, CEPA Japan, the Ministry of the Environment of Japan and the Ink Cartridge Recycling "Satogaeri" Project.

The article can be found in the INTECOL e-Bulletin here.

New Member Introduction: Higher Polytechnic School (EPS) of the University of Santiago de Compostela

Established in 1993 in the Campus of Lugo, (Galicia, NW Spain), the Higher Polytechnic School (Escola Politécnica Superior, EPS) is a faculty of the University of Santiago de Compostela specialized in technical studies, many of them related to the rural environment. Up-to-date, applied training is given in rural, food, and agriculture engineering, environment and forestry engineering, civil engineering, geomatic engineering (degrees); agricultural engineering, dairy production management, forestry engineering, wood engineering, landscape architecture, project management or sustainable land management (masters).

Also, research is developed in different departments through research groups specialized in the fields of agronomy, forestry, environment, rural planning and development, civil engineering, and geomatics. Among them, the ecological, economic and social basis for agricultural and forestry systems are addressed through specific research on cultural landscapes, landscape and land use planning, rural economy and sociology, landscape ecology and ecosystem services.

Additional information about the EPS can be found at http://www.usc.es/en/centros/eps/index.htmland also at the facebook page https://www.facebook.com/EPSLugo

Contact

Please be sure to let the Secretariat know if there are any changes in your e-mail address or contact information.

Secretariat of the International Partnership for the Satoyama Initiative
5–53–70 Jingumae
Shibuya-ku, Tokyo 150-8925
Japan

Tel: +81 3-5467-1212
Fax: +81 3-3499-2828

Email: isi@unu.edu

If you have been forwarded this newsletter and would like to SUBSCRIBE, you can do so on the IPSI website here.