NERC CZO Annual Meeting 2018

Overview

NERC CZO Annual Meeting 2018 is a joint research programme between the UK Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) and the National Science Foundation of China (NSFC).  It provides an opportunity for the programme participants to present and discuss major findings with each other and invited stakeholders.  The UK-China CZO programme seeks to understand ways to address the challenges for the delivery of China’s ecosystem services in association with their agricultural production and urbanisation.  This final workshop brings together research from our past 3 years of collaboration by 5 UK – China research consortia.   

We have made great progress developing a better understanding of the ecosystem services of soil and water resources in keys sites across China: ranging from the complex and fragile Karst ecosystems of Guizhou; the highly eroded Loess Plateau; the periurban agricultural soils of Shanghai; to the unique red soils of the Sunjia Critical Zone Observatory near Yangling. The programme has linked 5 projects closely, establishing a coherent research programme that interacts with other UK, China and international research programmes and networks. Together the projects have carried out internationally-leading scientific research that also achieves ODA outcomes for soil and water resources in China.  The research has delivered new knowledge that can be applied to other regions of the globe and complements the strong international network of CZOs. 
 
The annual meeting presented the major findings of our research, with talks and posters led by early career researchers and some of the lead scientists.  Invited guests set the scene of our research programme and helped chair discussions about the next steps in our collaboration.  By bringing the research together we will seek future activities including science and innovation based projects between the UK, China and other countries.  The research presented will demonstrate the value of the CZO approach in delivering the science necessary to achieve Sustainable Development Goals.