The second International Youth Forum of Soil and Water
Conservation (2nd IYFSWC) with the title of Climate Change
Impacts on Sediment Dynamics: Measurement, Modelling and Management was
held in beautiful Moscow successfully during August 26-31.
A corner of forum
This
forum was sponsored by WASWAC, and organized by the Lomonosov Moscow State
University (MSU). It is the second session following the first session held in
Nanchang in October 2015. It is worldwide forum focuses on the youth who are
contributed in the soil and water conservation. Totally 137 participants from
14 countries including China, Iran, Morocco, Russia, Austria, Egypt, Italy,
Nigeria, Serbia, Belgium, Germany, Japan, Poland and Ukraine have attended this
forum.
Erosion,
sediment delivery and sediment transport are natural geological processes that
influence the form and function of terrestrial and aquatic systems. These
processes are central to landscape and soil development, geochemical cycling,
material fluxes and river channel morphology across the globe. In addition,
they strongly influence water quality and ecosystems of the world's rivers and
oceans. A wide range of natural (i.e. wildfire) and anthropogenic (harvesting,
agriculture, urbanization) disturbances alter the rates and magnitudes of
erosion and related sediment dynamics which can have significant economic and
social implications. While several important changes to the earth's surface have
resulted from socio-economic (i.e. population growth. Land change, resource
extraction) factors, there is increasing concern for the potential importance
of climate change as a driver of future changes in erosion and sediment
dynamics and the wide range impacts thereof. This forum specifically addresses
the issue of climate change and its impact on erosion and sediment dynamics
with special emphasis on its implications for measurement, modelling and
management of sediment in a changing world.
Dr
Sergey Chalov, the deputy dean for international affairs of Faculty of
Geography in MSU was hosted the opening ceremony and gave a warm welcome for
all participants.
Prof.
Li Rui, the president of WASWAC, Prof. Ning Duihu, the Secretary-general of
WASWAC, Prof. Sergey Dobrolyubov, the dean of Faculty of Geography in MSU, and
the corresponding member of RAS, Prof. Nikolay Kasimov, the president of
Faculty of Geography in MSU, and the Academician of RAS, Prof. Kazimierz
Banasik, the vice-president of ICCE, and Prof. Paolo Porto, the ICCE Secretary,
attended this opening ceremony and gave speeches.
In
President Li Rui’s speech, a brief introduction on the forum was provided, a
heartful welcome was delivered, an earnest expectation for the young generation
was expressed, and a good wish for the forum was given.
The opening ceremony
During
the forum, 6 outstanding scholars provided all participants a very high-level
academic keynote presentation. The 6 keynote speakers are:
1.Prof. Jean Poesen, from
the devision of Geography and Toruism within the Department of Earth and
Environmental Sciences, KU Leuven, Belgium;
2.Dr Peter Strauss, the
head of the institute for Land and Water Management Research within the Federal
Agency for Water Management.
3.Prof. Helmut Habersack,
the UNESCO Chair on Integrated River Research and Management, from
Hydraulic Engineering and Modelling at the Department of Water, Atmosphere and
Environment at the University of Natural Resources and Life Science, Vienna,
Austria.
4.Prof. Valentin Golosov,
from Laboratory of Soil Erosion and Fluvial Process, Faculty of Geography in
MSU.
5.Prof. Lei Tingwu, from
the China Agricultural University, one of the Editor-in-Chief for WASWAC
official journal - International Soil and Water Conservation Research.
6.Prof. Miodrag Zlatic, the
former president of WASWAC, and a full professor at Faculty of Forestry,
Belgrade University, Serbia.
For
the young participants, to provide a full platform for them to communicate, to
express, and to discuss what researches they have been involved, up to 74 oral
presentations and 57 poster presentations have been arranged in 5 oral rooms
and 1 exhibition hall during this forum. All participants got the chance to
share their research with others.
To
make all participants clear about the achievement in soil erosion control and
water resources protection, the scientific tour was arranged on August 30. This
tour including two sites visiting.
The field tour
The
first one is a different types of soil erosion (sheet, rill, ephemeral gully
etc.) observation in the cultivated lands in this part of the Central Russia.
Erosion processes are observed during spring snow-melting in the end of March –
beginning of April and after heavy rain-storms during warm part of year (May –
September). Results of long-term monitoring of soil erosion, quantitative
assessment of the soil erosion rates and consequences of the cultivated land
reduction have been discussed during the field excursion.
The
second one is the Moscow water supply system. A canal constructed almost 80
years ago for Moskva-Volga has now became the biggest artificial waterway in
Russia, linking Moscow to the Volga River at Ivankovo, north of Moscow.
Participants have learned a lot about the water supply system and the
protection for the water sources locations.
As
an extra welfare, a training course Water-related natural hazards:
measurement and modeling has been provided during this forum. It included
7-session lectures, seminars, as well as workshops. The topics are mainly about
the following aspects:
1.How can we measure
erosion at plot scale, field scale and small watershed scale, what are the
challenges for these different scales of measurement and which types of
equipment exist
2.Ecomag: catchment scale
streamflow assessment for world’s large rivers
3.Soils of the world
4.Digital modeling of
erosion soil cover patterns
5.Quantitative assessment
of soil and gully erosion rates
6.Social economical factors
of soil and water conservation in the different landscape zones
7.Bed load measurements
techniques in river monitoring
Participants
for this course has got the official internationally recognized diploma of
Moscow State University (1 ECTS point), which was issued in the closing
ceremony of the forum.
As
one of the important content, the WASWAC
outstanding Youth Paper Award was released in the closing ceremony. Total
10 paper were evaluated from submitted manuscripts to receive this award. Each
first author for the ten papers has received 1000 USD honorarium and
certificate. As the sponsor of this award, Beijing DATUM Technology Development
CO.,LTD has dispatched staffs to attend this forum. The award issue ceremony
was tightly following the introduction proposed by DATUM.
The group photo for some participants
The
sponsors for this forum include WASWAC and MSU. The Co-organizers include China
Society of Soil and Water Conservation (CSSWC), International Research and
Training Center on Erosion and Sedimentation (IRTCES), The International
Commission on Continental Erosion (ICCE), The International Association of
Hydrological Sciences (IAHS), V.V. Dokuchaev Soil Science Institute, and the
UNESCO Chair at the University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences. Thanks
for the everything under their strong support!
