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IHOPE session on Water Management and Food Security

Venue

Kyoto, Japan

The research project will hold a special session, incorporating "deep time analyses" from around the world, during the Eight World Archaeological Congress, in Kyoto, Japan.

Wasser (Symbolbild)
Image: Edith Oosenbrug

In this IHOPE session researchers, using Historical Ecology, Environmental Humanities and Future Studies provide examples from Europe to Southern Africa of deep time analyses of landscapes, settlement systems and water relations to generate insights for future scenarios. Rockström and Falkenmark (2015) point to a doubling of population in Sub-Saharan Africa by 2050 with a predicted total of 2 billion people or 25% of the world population. The region is dependent on rural rain-fed agriculture and there is a need to double agricultural production. Current global changes make the regularity and amount of rain in the medium and long term
unpredictable. The very rapid urbanization with attendant concerns of urban food security underline the urgency of the situation. Despite the scope for intensification of standard agricultural
extension services, new approaches need to be taken which take human agency past, present and future into account. Water is not only good to drink it is also good to think (Strang 2014) and current theoretical insights will frame examples of past water harvesting, storage, distribution and use from different regions in Africa elsewhere and will be interrogated in terms of material and immaterial potential contributions to meet present day and future challenges.
IHOPE = Integrated History and Future of People on Earth.

Researchers from the Integrated History and Future of People on Earth (IHOPE) project will convene a session at the Eight World Archaeological Congress, "an international forum for discussion for anyone who is concerned with the study of the past." The session is titled "IHOPE session on Water Management and Food Security. " It will cover how studies of the past can provide insights about future efforts to secure food and water for expanding populations around the globe, including in rapidly urbanising areas like Sub-Saharan Africa.

Organisers:

Paul Sinclair (Uppsala University / Sweden), Paul Lane (Uppsala University / Sweden), Innocent Pikirayi (University of Pretoria / South Africa) and Angus Graham (Uppsala University / Sweden)

Informations and contact:

http://www.futureearth.org/events/ihope-session-water-management-and-food-security

Categories

  • Archaeology
  • Food security
Languages: German