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Rapid and Catastrophic Environmental Changes during the last 10,000 years Mauritania in January 2004 & Turkey in June 2004 |
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Nature is not always the benign provider of shelter and the carer to all needs. Nature has a dark side, capable of extreme and sudden geological violence. The International Council of Scientific Unions (ICSU) and the International Geological Correlation Programme of IUGS and UNESCO have recognised this by funding two new projects. Indicators of these changes are available. We should watch them carefully!
- ICSU Grant, category I, on "Dark nature: rapid natural change and human response", from 2004 to 2005
- UNESCO-IGCP 490 project grant on "The role of Holocene environmental catastrophes in human history", from 2003 to 2007.
The two first meetings are currently being organised. The first one will be in Mauritania in January 2004 where scientists will forget about electricity and venture into the Saharan desert either on camels back or in four wheel-drive (http://www.brunel.ac.uk/depts/ges/igcp490/maur2004.htm). Out in the desert, under the shelter of an acacia tree, presentations and discussions will be held on desertification, coastal wetland protection, ground water, dust, upwelling strength, tsunami, health and the collapse of past civilisations. Read more. Contact: Suzanne.Leroy@brunel.ac.uk. The second one wild be held in Turkey in June 2004 and will bring earth scientists, archaeologists and anthropologists together to examine human responses to past rapid environmental change in the ancient world. After the three-day discussion meeting, a field trip will take participants around some of the spectacular cultural and geological sites of western Turkey. Contact: Iain.stewart@brunel.ac.uk. The other meetings are planned for Madagascar-Mozambique in Autumn 2004 (sylvi.haldorsen@ijvf.nlh.no and David Burney, Paleoman9@aol.com and BURNEY@FORDHAM.EDU), Argentina (Eduardo Piovano, epiovano@efn.uncor.edu and Jose Sayago, sayagojm@infovia.com.ar), and the Canadian Arctic in spring 2005 (Tony Berger aberger@uvic.ca). Finally, a wrap-up symposium will take place in Como, Italy, in Autumn 2005 (Alessandro Michetti, michetti@fis.unico.it). The IGCP 490 programme, which is for five years, will have additional meetings in Papua-New Guinea in 2006 (Hugh Davies, hdavies@upng.ac.pg and Ted Bryant, ebryant@uow.edu.au) and Egypt in 2007 (fekrihassan@hotmail.com). The outcomes of these multidisciplinary meetings will be a series of conference proceedings, many of them in the Geological Society of London and a contribution to the webcyclopedia of IUGG. Sponsors: IUGS, IGU, IUGG, INQUA, IUGSGeoind, UNESCO, WAC, IAG Suzanne Leroy
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