Category Archives: environment

Visualising Climate And Landscape

25 February 2023environment, monitoring, policy, remote sensing, researchKarl Donert

Earth Map (https://earthmap.org/) is an innovative and free application developed by the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations. It was designed in the framework of the partnership between the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations and Google. Earth map facilitates the visualisation, processing, and analysis of land and climate data.

It was created to support countries, research institutes and even farmers with internet access to monitor their land in an easy, integrated and multi-temporal manner.

Earth Map allows everyone to visualise, process and analyse satellite imagery and global datasets on climate, vegetation, fires, biodiversity, geo-social and other topics.

Earth Map’s data is divided into thematic segments – Climate, Geosocial, Vegetation, Land Degradation Neutrality, Water, Satellite images, Land maps, Forestry, Fire, Geophysical, Soil and Biodiversity.

The data allows users to visualise different layers of information to create maps and to generate statistics to describe the areas of interest. These layers include the European Space Agency’s Climate Change Initiative Land Cover, the Copernicus ECMWF Temperature and Precipitation ERA5 data, the Global Forest Change tree cover loss, Nightlights.

Earth Map allows users to access and display information from multiple time periods. It thereby gives both a temporal (accessing time series data) and a spatial (visualising places) perspective to their areas of interest.

Users need no prior knowledge of remote sensing or Geographical Information Systems (GIS).

Find out more – Visit Earth Map

Pesticides in the landscape

1 February 2023environment, landscape, monitoringKarl Donert

Pesticides are a serious threat to food and agricultural systems. In the field, they kill not only pests, but also pollinators such as bees, and harm the quality of soils. They threaten the health of farmers and agricultural workers. But their toxic imprint will spiral in the landscape – as pesticides can be found in food, water and air. They find their way into our bodies and our living environment.

Pesticide Checkup is an interesting initiative started earlier this year has now produced some interesting insights regarding the way pesticide influence our environments and more importantly – the human body.

Between May and August 2022, 300 people from across 10 European countries participated in the citizen science project to get their hair tested for pesticide residues. The independent laboratory EXPOZOM analysed the samples for the presence of 30 different pesticides.

The key findings from the report show that:
• Nearly every third person (29%) had residues of at least one pesticide in their hair. 25 out of the 30 sampled substances were detected.
• Farmers, farm workers and people living in rural areas usually had higher concentrations of pesticides in their hair.
• The top 3 pesticides detected were: the herbicide Prosulfocarb, the fungicide Tebuconazol and the insecticide Acetamiprid.

However, the results are not representative of the overall EU population due to under-sampling, the finding shows a trend and is consistent with empirical studies on the topic. Read the full report here.

Back in May 2020, the grassroots union published the Farm to Fork Strategy – a statement of intent for transforming food systems.

One of the goals of the strategy is to reduce the composition of pesticides by 50% by 2030. However, this goal is not legally bound to national governments and agrochemical lobbies.
The EU is currently planning its pesticide regulations, but there is a risk of less ambitious outcomes than European citizens would like. According to Angeliki Lyssimachou,

Senior Science Policy Officer at the Health and Environment Alliance (HEAL), “Surveys like the Pesticide-CheckUp show that EU-wide measures to reduce exposure to toxic pesticides are urgently needed to safeguard the health of vulnerable groups, such as farmers and residents of agricultural areas. European governments and the Commission must put health first and move towards an agricultural model that does not depend on pesticides or other harmful chemicals”.

Find out more: GoodFood-GoodFarming

GeoCultura

15 January 2023environment, landscapeKarl Donert

GEOCULTURA is the 8th Biennale of Contemporary Art

The city of Thessaloniki, Greece hosts the 8th Biennale of Contemporary Art which takes place from December 2022 to May 2023.

The main theme is Geocultura, a term deriving from the combination of “geo-“ and “culture” pointing out the connection between the land cultivation and the mind cultivation.

“The exchange of ideas, values and norms, within a context of a multitude of cultural, geographical and political debates and conflicts, is at the core of the concept of ‘geoculture’ in the political and social sciences.”

Modern life demands and successive crises, such as economic, climate and refugee, have made people redefine their connection with the land; turn to organic farming, try to achieve better management of natural resources, protect biodiversity. Art, perceived as a means to understand the world, aims to raise our environmental awareness and the artists who take part pose questions and offer various versions of the future through their works.

The Thessaloniki Biennale of Contemporary Art is financed by Greece and the European Union (European Regional Development Fund) is organised by MOMus and implemented by MOMus-Museum of Contemporary Art – Macedonian Museum of Contemporary Art and State Museum of Contemporary Art Collections.

For more information visit the website