Cop 27, the Ciheam of Bari in the chair in Sharm el Sheik
Research
NoonNovember 20, 2022 - 12:18
The agronomic institute, based in Valenzano, is among the protagonists of the discussions on the rational use of water in crops. Director Raeli: climate battles are also won with "scientific diplomacy"
from Rosanna Lampugnani
The battle against climate change that affects Africa above all, the battle against desertification that also threatens southern Italy, the battle for controlled migratory flows: these battles can also be won with "scientific diplomacy". . Such an approach seems almost utopian, yet there are signs and "facts" that demonstrate Maurizio Raeli's assumption. Returning with his working group from Sharm el Sheik, from the annual United Nations Conference on climate, now in its twenty-seventh edition (Cop 27), the director of Ciheam Bari - the International Center for Advanced Mediterranean Agronomic Studies, whose headquarters Teodoro Miano from Puglia was appointed general secretary in Paris – thus summarizing the work that the Bari institute has been carrying out for decades, which over the years has welcomed students and researchers from 100 different countries, mainly from Africa and Eastern Europe. And of the rest of the six meetings in Sharm led by Ciheam, some were led by "foreigners" who became Italian citizens and researchers, such as the Lebanese Roula Khadra or the Albanian Pandi Zdruli.
The shadows and lights of Cop 27
Raeli does not hide the shadows that obscure the conclusions of Cop 27 (for example: the unresolved question of refreshments for poor countries on the road to the green transition), but is keen to underline the "light" of this event: the installation of a pavilion for the Mediterranean. "It is a striking result, because for the first time the emphasis is placed on an area that is crucial for the fate of the planet". It was the Union for the Mediterranean, which includes the countries bordering the mare nostrum, who pushed in this direction and after all this was the horrible climatic year for the area, with overheating exceeding 20% the average temperature of the whole world. The immediate future is at risk and it's up to agriculture, with the care of water resources and land resources, to be at the forefront.
The emissions
"30% of harmful emissions come from agricultural activities which, moreover, use 70% of fresh water" and the researchers are also working on this with an important commitment on the other side of the Mediterranean, in particular in Egypt (one of the 13 Countries on the board of the International Centre) to which 10 million have recently gone for the mechanization of agriculture through debt remission. And it could only be Italy that moved in this direction. At the recent agricultural machinery fair in Bologna, there was an increase in the sector's turnover of 21% in 2021 and 40% in the first eight months of this year, because - adds Raeli - «companies have understood that the future marches on diversification of production, on technologies that make it possible to reduce water consumption and rationalize its use».
The Tarantino example of Stornara and Tara
A virtuous example - told by the people of Bari at Cop 27 - is part of the React4med project, also implemented in Stornara and Tara: sensors inserted into the soil that hosts table vines signal the need for water to the grower's app, who can proceed with the 'watering, even remotely. But perhaps the most gratifying experience, a concrete example of scientific diplomacy, is the one told by Pandi Zdruli: «In a lunar territory of Egypt, on the border with Libya, we intervened on 13 totally arid hectares and after three years we left the local populations, Bedouin tribes, lands cultivated with olive trees and vegetables. But above all, we explained how to use the best cultivation technologies, how to conserve water, how to counteract soil erosion».
The school of water
Therefore an extraordinary success to be replicated elsewhere, for example in Libya, in the arid area of the Fezzan region, while in Egypt work is underway for the creation of a water school. There are many projects that the Bari agronomic institute has around the Mediterranean, carried out by combining research, training, cooperation, with people's needs at the centre. And there are many collaborations with universities, both foreign and Italian: it is above all girls who are the most numerous and motivated to follow the path to save the planet after graduation, says Daniela Guida who held a training course in Sharm el -Sheikh. Roula Khadra says that in Lebanon "we all study looking elsewhere, because we know that if we want to do something useful, especially for our country, we cannot stop in our lands". And so, not surprisingly, of the group returning from Cop 27 she is the proudest of the mission in Egypt, because to get to Puglia, to become an Italian and a researcher at the Ciheam branch in Bari, was a great challenge, which she won.
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November 20, 2022 | 12:18
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