Poverty and Equity

To help eradicate poverty and ensure a fair share for all, IIASA researchers identified strategies to avoid tragedies of the commons, such as over-use of natural resources. Equitable governance was also a focus for the institute, and researchers worked to identify “clumsy” solutions for highly contentious policy debates—solutions that involve all voices in reaching a negotiated compromise.

Africa


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Energy Access

The Energy Program (ENE) is analyzing how improving access to modern energy technologies in developing countries can potentially improve human health and wellbeing. more

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Governance in transition

Meeting the challenges of climate change, disasters, and competition for energy and resources requires transitions in the way we govern. In 2015 the focus of the Risk, Policy and Vulnerability (RPV) Program’s work on governance was on open government, stakeholder perceptions, and the involvement of multiple stakeholder perspectives in participatory settings. more

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Integrated Solutions for Water, Energy, and Land

The Transitions to New Technologies (TNT) Program played a key role in the proposal for a large-scale, multi-year research project to analyze the synergies and trade-offs between different natural resource systems: Integrated Solutions for Water, Energy, and Land (IS-WEL). more

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Risk analysis and modeling

The Risk, Policy and Vulnerability (RPV) Program built on its breakthrough in assessment of flood-risk distributions which accounts for spatial correlation between river basins and therefore avoids underestimation of risk. The program has now incorporated different types of copula dependency measures, such as the Archimedian- and Frank-based copula, and various dependency structures. more

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Supporting land-use policy

Ecosystems Services and Management (ESM) researchers have been working to support policymakers in Brazil and the Congo Basin to identify land-use and forest conservation policies that are economically, socially, and environmentally optimal. more

Asia


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Energy Access

The Energy Program (ENE) is analyzing how improving access to modern energy technologies in developing countries can potentially improve human health and wellbeing. more

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Identifying common sources of population heterogeneity

The World Population Program (POP), with three other IIASA programs—Energy (ENE), Mitigation of Air Pollution and Greenhouse Gases (MAG), and Ecosystems Services and Management (ESM) – continues to implement the crosscutting project “Accounting for socioeconomic heterogeneity in IIASA models” started in 2014. more

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Integrated Solutions for Water, Energy, and Land

The Transitions to New Technologies (TNT) Program played a key role in the proposal for a large-scale, multi-year research project to analyze the synergies and trade-offs between different natural resource systems: Integrated Solutions for Water, Energy, and Land (IS-WEL). more

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Linking climate and development policies

The project Linking Climate and Development Policies – Leveraging International Networks and Knowledge Sharing (CD-LINKS) kicked off in September 2015. CD-LINKS aims to study the links between climate policies and multiple sustainable development objectives. more

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Risk analysis and modeling

The Risk, Policy and Vulnerability (RPV) Program built on its breakthrough in assessment of flood-risk distributions which accounts for spatial correlation between river basins and therefore avoids underestimation of risk. The program has now incorporated different types of copula dependency measures, such as the Archimedian- and Frank-based copula, and various dependency structures. more

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Understanding disaster resilience

Questions of fiscal, social, and ecological resilience have become fundamental to addressing the global issues of risk management, climate change adaptation, and transitions to a sustainable future. However, operationalization of the concept has remained elusive; this is where Risk, Policy and Vulnerability (RPV) Program made substantial progress in 2015. more

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Vulnerability to natural disasters

Explicitly accounting for population heterogeneity—in particular with respect to level of education—provides an analytical tool for anticipating future vulnerability. Community participation and strong social networks can also aid preparedness to natural disasters in vulnerable regions, shows new research conducted in the south of Thailand. more

Europe


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Governance in transition

Meeting the challenges of climate change, disasters, and competition for energy and resources requires transitions in the way we govern. In 2015 the focus of the Risk, Policy and Vulnerability (RPV) Program’s work on governance was on open government, stakeholder perceptions, and the involvement of multiple stakeholder perspectives in participatory settings. more

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Linking climate and development policies

The project Linking Climate and Development Policies – Leveraging International Networks and Knowledge Sharing (CD-LINKS) kicked off in September 2015. CD-LINKS aims to study the links between climate policies and multiple sustainable development objectives. more

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Risk analysis and modeling

The Risk, Policy and Vulnerability (RPV) Program built on its breakthrough in assessment of flood-risk distributions which accounts for spatial correlation between river basins and therefore avoids underestimation of risk. The program has now incorporated different types of copula dependency measures, such as the Archimedian- and Frank-based copula, and various dependency structures. more

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Risk pooling and sharing: Designing and assessing disaster safety nets

In 2015 the Paris COP21 and the G7 Initiative on Climate Risk Insurance showed that insurance against the impacts of climate change is a key issue. The Risk, Policy and Vulnerability (RPV) Program played a role in the history and drafting of both initiatives and is contributing to the evidence needed for their implementation. more

Global


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Advancing the theory of demographic metabolism

This theory puts the age-old wisdom that societies change through generational replacement into analytical form. Using the tools of multidimensional demography it presents a formalized model that allows for quantitative forecasts of such societal changes for decades into the future. more

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Aiding modeling and assessment projects

One of the goals of the Water Futures and Solutions (WFaS) initiative is to establish a knowledge hub for systems analytic approaches to water challenges. To facilitate this, the program has been working closely with the Intersectoral Impact Model Intercomparison Project (ISI-MIP) to help develop climate-impact models that fully incorporate water issues. more

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Benefit sharing in emissions offsetting

The Methods for Economic Decision-Making under Uncertainty (MEDU) group has identified promising approaches to emissions offsetting in the energy sector under Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD) mechanism. These include increasing risk-aversion of energy producers, exposing risk-averse behavior, and activating a benefit-sharing mechanism. more

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Decent Living Energy

The Energy Program (ENE) launched the Decent Living Energy project based on a European Research Council Starting Grant award in June 2015. This project assesses the energy needs and associated greenhouse gas emissions of eradicating poverty in key emerging economies. more

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Economic performance and human capital

IIASA research has firmly established the fact that improvements in the educational attainment structure of populations are a key driver of economic growth. The new set of global Shared Socioeconomic Pathways scenarios—which define alternative population trajectories by age, sex, and six levels of educational attainment—reflect this, showing that economic growth trajectories follow those of human capital. more

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Enhancing community flood resilience

In collaboration with the Risk, Policy and Vulnerability (RPV) Program the Water (WAT) Program has continued to contribute to methods to enhance flood resilience. To this end, WAT has led development of the Flood Resilience System Framework (FLORES) to integrate disaster risk management and development perspectives. more

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Equitable governance of common goods

Long-standing IIASA work on how to facilitate cooperation has acquired additional strength through a cross-cutting initiative aiming to compare, combine, and integrate approaches from different disciplines. Formal and informal institutions for overcoming social dilemmas and the tragedy of the commons are at the center of this research. more

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Integrated Solutions for Water, Energy, and Land

The Transitions to New Technologies (TNT) Program played a key role in the proposal for a large-scale, multi-year research project to analyze the synergies and trade-offs between different natural resource systems: Integrated Solutions for Water, Energy, and Land (IS-WEL). more

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International carbon markets under uncertainty

The Ecosystems Services and Management (ESM) Program’s Methods for Economic Decision-Making under Uncertainty (MEDU) group has advanced analysis of offsets and permits in the context of international carbon markets and investment uncertainty. more

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Linking climate and development policies

The project Linking Climate and Development Policies – Leveraging International Networks and Knowledge Sharing (CD-LINKS) kicked off in September 2015. CD-LINKS aims to study the links between climate policies and multiple sustainable development objectives. more

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Negative Emissions Technologies

The Ecosystems Services and Management (ESM) Program’s Policy and Science Interface (PSI) group has advanced research into negative emissions technologies—ways of removing greenhouse gases from the atmosphere—investigating whether they are a viable way of tackling climate change. more

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Risk analysis and modeling

The Risk, Policy and Vulnerability (RPV) Program built on its breakthrough in assessment of flood-risk distributions which accounts for spatial correlation between river basins and therefore avoids underestimation of risk. The program has now incorporated different types of copula dependency measures, such as the Archimedian- and Frank-based copula, and various dependency structures. more

teaserimage

Risk pooling and sharing: Designing and assessing disaster safety nets

In 2015 the Paris COP21 and the G7 Initiative on Climate Risk Insurance showed that insurance against the impacts of climate change is a key issue. The Risk, Policy and Vulnerability (RPV) Program played a role in the history and drafting of both initiatives and is contributing to the evidence needed for their implementation. more

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Socioeconomics of risk management and climate adaptation

The Sendai Framework for Action, discussed in [1], brought global attention to the urgent need to simultaneously consider development and climate change priorities as part of disaster risk management. The international rhetoric has now, more emphatically than ever, shifted from ex-post reconstruction and relief to ex-ante disaster risk reduction and financing. more

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Stochastic GLOBIOM and systemic risks

Stochastic GLOBIOM has been used to analyze interdependencies and trade-offs between structural and financial measures for hedging systemic risks and food, energy, water, environmental security in land use systems, which can be induced by climate change and weather variability. more

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The World in 2050

The World in 2050 (TWI2050) is an international collaboration launched by IIASA with international partners that will involve almost all research programs at IIASA with a focus on deriving viable pathways for achieving all 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). more

North America


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Linking climate and development policies

The project Linking Climate and Development Policies – Leveraging International Networks and Knowledge Sharing (CD-LINKS) kicked off in September 2015. CD-LINKS aims to study the links between climate policies and multiple sustainable development objectives. more

Oceania


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Risk analysis and modeling

The Risk, Policy and Vulnerability (RPV) Program built on its breakthrough in assessment of flood-risk distributions which accounts for spatial correlation between river basins and therefore avoids underestimation of risk. The program has now incorporated different types of copula dependency measures, such as the Archimedian- and Frank-based copula, and various dependency structures. more

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Vulnerability to natural disasters

Explicitly accounting for population heterogeneity—in particular with respect to level of education—provides an analytical tool for anticipating future vulnerability. Community participation and strong social networks can also aid preparedness to natural disasters in vulnerable regions, shows new research conducted in the south of Thailand. more

South America


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Enhancing community flood resilience

In collaboration with the Risk, Policy and Vulnerability (RPV) Program the Water (WAT) Program has continued to contribute to methods to enhance flood resilience. To this end, WAT has led development of the Flood Resilience System Framework (FLORES) to integrate disaster risk management and development perspectives. more

teaserimage

Linking climate and development policies

The project Linking Climate and Development Policies – Leveraging International Networks and Knowledge Sharing (CD-LINKS) kicked off in September 2015. CD-LINKS aims to study the links between climate policies and multiple sustainable development objectives. more

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Supporting land-use policy

Ecosystems Services and Management (ESM) researchers have been working to support policymakers in Brazil and the Congo Basin to identify land-use and forest conservation policies that are economically, socially, and environmentally optimal. more

Africa


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To REDD or not to REDD?

Maria Rivera, of the University of Maryland, USA, used a comprehensive review to examine whether REDD+ is the best policy instrument for the Virunga Park in the Democratic Republic of Congo. more

Asia


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Nutrition transition and the future of food demand in India

Kakoli Borkotoky, of the International Institute for Population Sciences, India, investigated the trends in dietary patterns in India, showing that total calorie intake increases with education, but the consumption of some foods, such as red meat and alcohol, declined with an increase in education. more

Europe


Global


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Modeling soil carbon and nitrogen cycling based on microbial ecology

Christina Kaiser is working in the Evolution and Ecology Program using a computer model that she developed and tested herself which simulates decomposing litter or soil at microbial-relevant scales to understand mechanisms emerging from complex microbial interactions at the microscale. more

South America


 


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Last edited: 30 March 2016

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