SETAC Seville: Global Challenges. An Emergency for Environmental Sciences

News that appeared in SETAC GLOBE and is no longer available on the website https://www.setac.org/publish-with-setac/setac-globe.html

Following the successful SETAC SciCon, the SETAC Europe 30th Annual Meeting held fully online, our energies turn now to the organization of the SETAC Europe 31st Annual Meeting from 2–6 May 2021 in Seville, Spain. An intensive effort is being currently made by the SETAC Europe Council and the SETAC Europe office team to analyze how the excellent advances made with SETAC SciCon in virtual logistics can improve future SETAC Europe meetings. This will probably have a start with SETAC Seville, which will be held in the modern facilities of the new FIBES conference center. In the meantime, I would like, with these lines, inspire your participation in the meeting by explaining why the theme, “Global Challenges. An Emergency for Environmental Sciences,” was chosen and the process behind it. It may be a little surprising for many of you to learn that this theme was proposed to SETAC Europe before the COVID-19 pandemic affected Europe in March this year. Indeed, the motivation for this theme had originated well before that, as a result of several committee activities during recent years, such as t e EFSA Stakeholder Bureau, CEFIC External Scientific Advisory Panel and FAO Global Soil Partnership – Soil Pollution. They exposed me to a series of discussions, from different perspectives, on how the world could evolve in the next 30 years, and the new challenges to environmental quality expected as a result of the climate change, the depletion of natural resources and world population growth. Within these three coordinates, the human pressure over the environment is undoubtedly subject to the evolution of the global trade, the economic growth of countries and regions, and population shifts from an increased urbanization and migrations. Environmental sciences must provide solutions to the issues caused in this changing scenario by the global rearrangement of the agri-food chain, the uses of lands and coasta ecosystems, and the innovation in the chemical industry. The risks and management of chemical pollution in soil, water and air, the sustainability of production, as well as the life cycle of products and processes and the effects on the ecosystem services should be determined intime. Integrative approaches are needed that not only address the new potential risks but also find optimized solutions that balance the various needs of mankind in a sustainable way and, at the same time, guarantee the protection of the environment, following the principles of the European Green Deal. These advances should all be performed under the guarantees of a research integrity, sometimes put in tension under scenarios of high time pressure and hypercompetition for limited resources for environmental research. The current crisis in which the whole world is immersed today seems to be accelerating many of these foreseen global tendencies. The theme of this congress fits very well with the mission and strategy of SETAC Europe. Up-to-date environmental approaches should promptly solve the associated ecotoxicological concerns, sustainability aspects and remediation options of chemical pollution occurring at a global scale. The global dimension of SETAC and the tripartite essence of communication among academic, industrial and regulatory actors guarantee the appropriate stature and fitness of the scientific knowledge, which is needed for these environmental issues. With approximately 2,000 members from all around Europe, this global thinking finds its best place in SETAC Europe, the biggest environmental community of our continent. If you want to participate already at the vanguard of the scientific program of the meeting, the call for sessions is open to all SETAC members. You are welcome to draft your parallel session proposals on the topics mentioned above, or any other topics that you may want to propos (see the tracks), and submit them by 15 August. The excellent group of scientists, composing our Scientific Committee, will be happy to evalu te your proposals and integrate them into an attractive scientific program on the immediate environmental dimensions of global challenges. I look forward to welcoming you to Seville, a beautiful city in the South of Spain, where I live. So save the date, submit your session proposals, and get ready for SETAC Europe’s 31st Annual Meeting.

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