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Thursday, May 4, 2017
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
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New grants fund shared sustainability research
By JENNIFER MEER
Summer Managing News Editor
On Friday, four University of
Michigan research projects received
almost $500,000 total in grant money
from the Graham Sustainability
Institute— an initiative that supports
research and education at the
University under the Office of the
Provost. All four studies are related to
sustainability and are funded by the
Institute’s Emerging Opportunities
Program, which provides funding for
University research in sustainability
and
promotes
cross-disciplinary
collaboration with external partners.
In
the
Graham
Institute’s
announcement
of
the
awards,
University President Mark Schlissel
said the projects are reflective of the
University’s work in sustainability.
“These
projects
reflect
an
exceptional range of sustainability
initiatives being led by U-M faculty
in partnership with local and global
partners,” he said. “I’m confident the
results from these efforts will lead to
meaningful and lasting impacts.”
The awards consisted of two
types of grants: Transformation
and Catalyst. The Transformation
Grant — the larger of the two — is
a
three-year,
$150,000-per-year
opportunity.
According
to
an
informational
slideshow
on
the
Emerging Opportunities Program, it
supports collaborative research and
assessment projects and “projects
with
potential
for
significantly
greater impact” than Catalyst Grants.
Catalyst grants — four to six of which
are awarded each year — support
more
short-term
collaborative
projects; studies that receive these
grants are typically at an earlier stage
of research.
John Callewaert, the director
of
the
Emerging
Opportunities
Program, said the program aims to
encourage collaboration between
disciplines — those from the School of
Public Health, the School of Natural
Resources and Environment and the
Urban Planning Program, among
others.
“We’re trying to leverage the
breadth and depth of sustainability
activity at the University,” he said.
“In the request for proposals we put
out, we say the team of researchers
has to reflect at least two U of M
units — (for example,) someone
from Engineering and then someone
from outside of Engineering … The
reason for that is twofold. One is
sustainability challenges are not just
defined to one discipline… The other
thing is there are few institutions like
U of M that have the excellence across
so many disciplines. What we’re
doing is trying to do what we can to
leverage that, bring that together and
encourage it.”
Another element of the research
projects, according to Callewaert,
is they incorporate partners from
outside the University.
Transformation grant
A project entitled “Leveraging
existing data and insights into the
policy process to accelerate progress
toward achieving sustainable diets in
the global south” received this year’s
Transformation Grant.
In
partnership
with
the
International Center for Tropical
Agriculture
—
a
non-profit
organization that works to improve
farming techniques in developing
countries — this study aims to analyze
data on, and improve, sustainable diets
in Kenya and Vietnam. According
to the Michigan News, poor-quality
diets underlie many diseases, while
agricultural production contributes
to greenhouse gas emissions. In
Kenya and Vietnam, almost a quarter
of preschool-age children are stunted
and the countries face increasing
obesity.
Andrew Jones, John G. Searle
Associate Professor of Nutritional
Sciences at the School of Public
Health, is the project leader.
According to Jones, CIAT has
committed to addressing sustainable
food systems in Kenya and Vietnam.
It is supported by the Agriculture
for Nutrition and Health research
program; both CIAT and A4NH are
part of CGIAR — a global research
partnership for sustainability.
“They’re very much interested
in understanding how to carry out
research that looks at food systems
and sustainability of food systems
and also to develop, not just research
for the sake of new knowledge, but
also to put it into action and make
sure it is applied for further human
development goals,” he said.
Jones explained the researchers
are looking at data on diets, nutrition
of women and children and many
aspects of food systems, such as
environmental impacts of food and
spatial data sets to help understand
distribution of different aspects of
food systems.
“We’re trying to bring together
currently-available
data
to
understand where the gaps are
in terms of what our knowledge
is
around
food
systems
and
sustainability of food systems and
also to understand what are the
information needs of key stakeholders
in these countries — decision-makers,
in particular, who are going to be
making decisions around what our
food systems will look like ten years
from now, twenty years from now,
thirty years for now, and how to make
them sustainable,” he said.
LSA senior Selena Joarder is the
president of FeelGood, a student
organization that seeks a “sustainable
end to extreme poverty,” according to
its website.
In an email, Joarder noted the
importance of the study’s impact on
policy.
“Sustainable
food
systems
and
sustainable
diets
promote
environmental
and
individual
health,” she wrote.
Read more at MichiganDaily.com