Sustainability

Climate, Biodiversity, Land use

Sustainability

The UN's Sustainable Development Goals specify which societal challenges are to be solved by 2030. With research on climate change, adaptation to extreme events such as floods, biodiversity and sustainable land use, the University of Bern supports the search for concrete solutions in both the global North and the South.

Current

New endowed professorship

Climate Impact and Public Health

With the support of Mobilière Cooperative, the University of Bern has been able to establish an endowed professorship for climate and health. Within this framework, Ana Vicedo is researching an aspect of climate change that has so far only been insufficiently explored in Switzerland.

Media release

Cereal cultivation in arid regions

Microbes, algae and genetic engineering for more stable yields

Lorena Ramirez Gonzales is working to make maize and teff more drought-tolerant. In the interview, she explains how her work is helping to stabilize agriculture in arid regions and improve food security.

Science through the lense

Shifiting cultivation in Myanmar

Shifting cultivation – locally known as Jhum – practiced by the Indigenous Naga people in the mountains of Northwest Myanmar is more than agriculture: It’s a sustainable practice that supports communities and ecosystems.

Centre for Development and Environment (CDE)

A question for Astrid Zabel

Are we running out of chocolate?

Environmental economist Astrid Zabel explains the impact of the European Deforestation Regulation on the cultivation and consumption of goods.

Fair trade

What will the EU deforestation regulation change?

In future, the EU will ban imports of certain raw materials and products from deforested areas. This will affect small businesses in the Global South and Swiss companies. Elisabeth Bürgi Bonanomi and Astrid Zabel from the Center for Development and Environment provide an assessment.

CDE Spotlight

People

Nils Tinner

The mind behind the warning system for tropical nights

The "Bernometer" weather app helps the people of Bern to cope with heatwaves. The initiator of the project is Nils Tinner, a Master's student at the Oeschger Centre for Climate Change Research.

Teaching scientific thinking

Stefan Brönnimann: How political would you like it to be?

How do professors manage to keep the discourse in their courses open and unbiased? And what experiences do they have outside the lecture halls with attempts at political appropriation? A climatologist expresses his own opinion.

Thomas Stocker is given emeritus status

“Climate research in Bern is a brand”

Thomas Stocker is one of the figureheads of the University of Bern and a climate researcher of international renown. Among other things, he had a leading position on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Now, he is being given emeritus status. In this interview, he takes a look back at his career, tells us about an offer he once received from Cambridge and talks about orchids and racing bikes.

Promoting innovation

Higher crop yields thanks to data science

Climate change and a growing world population are putting increasing pressure on grain production. With his work, Fabian Guignard aims to help make wheat cultivation more efficient by recommending personalised varieties.

Climate

Tufted grass, bush crickets and climate change

Based in Bern, Suz Everingham coordinates a global research network called the Bug-Network. This is the unusual story of a young biologist who has moved from the ocean in Australia to the River Aare.

Biochemie

Adapting to the rise in temperature of our planet

Biochemist Rodrigo Siqueira Reis studies how RNA structures function in the adaptation of plants to higher temperatures. The aim is to gain a better basic understanding of how plants adapt to the circumstances of climate change.

Uni Bern Magazin: Thema Sustainability