ICTA - Institut de Ciència i Tecnologia Ambientals

El Locos por la Tierra retoma las sesiones presenciales

Después de hacer diversas sesiones en formato virtual, el programa Locos por la Tierra impartido por el ICTA-UAB reanudó el pasado día 27 de junio sus sesiones formativas en formato presencial.

What do we breathe when in the forest?

For the first time, a study characterizes the forest chemistry of the air under the canopy of a Mediterranean holm oak forest and detects maximum concentrations in July and August.

Catalonia's Scientific Contributions to Fighting Covid-19

Sixty ICREA researchers, including Isabelle Anguelovski of the ICTA-UAB, lead more than a hundred research activities on Covid-19.

Academia in the Time of COVID-19: Towards an Ethics of Care

Computer Platform Gives Visibility to Catalonia's Small Villages

A research team from the UAB, in collaboration with the Association of Microvillages of Catalonia, has created a Geographic Information System (GIS) for Active and Sustainable Hamlets (GISASH), which gathers information on the state of and services offered by the more than 330 municipalities in Catalonia with fewer than 500 inhabitants.

Environmental justice defenders victims of violence and murder

Grassroots movements halt environmental degradation in up to 27% of environmental conflicts worldwide, according to a study by the ICTA-UAB.

Technological changes and new low-carbon lifestyles, key to mitigating climate change impacts

In order to mitigate climate change impacts and achieve a more sustainable society, it is necessary to transform the current energy system based on fossil fuels into a model based on renewable energies.

Exploring climate change impacts through popular proverbs

Members of an irrigation community doing maintenance work in an acequia de careo (irrigation canal built at the top of the mountain) to improve the circulation of water for irrigation and human consumption.

Neolithic vessels reveal dairy consumption in Europe 7,000 years ago

Pottery from the site located in Verson (Francia) analysed during the research (Picture by Annabelle Cocollos, Conseil départemental du Calvados ou CD14 publicada en Germain-Vallée et al.

Mapping out the impacts of pollution upon Indigenous Peoples worldwide

Sulphur mine in Ijen, Java, Indonesia. Picture by Joan de la Malla.

Economic growth is incompatible with biodiversity conservation

A study involving more than 20 specialists in conservation ecology and ecological economics highlights the contradiction between economic growth and biodiversity conservation.

Encuesta: El rol del verde residencial durante el confinamiento por el brote de COVID-19 en España

El grupo de investigación BCNUEJ (www.bcnuej.org) del ICTA-UAB (https://ictaweb.uab.cat/) y del IMIM (www.imim.es) está realizando un estudio sobre el papel del verde residencial (vegetación interior, en balcones, en terrazas, cubiertas verdes, jardines particulares, etc.

ICTA-UAB shares protective material with hospitals

ICTA-UAB is since last Monday 16 March 2020, an Institute with Restricted Access. Most of the laboratories are empty, the Scientific and Technical Services are closed, only the basic services are working and most of the people is working and staying at home.

Higher and earlier pollen concentrations expected for this spring

Spring and summer pollination will begin a few days earlier than usual and in important numbers, reaching higher than average levels (from the 1994-2019 period).

Power struggles hinder urban adaptation policies to climate change

Transformative actions implemented by cities to address and mitigate the impacts of climate change may be hindered by political struggles for municipal power.

Analysis of tropical fire soot deposited in the ocean will help predict future global climate changes

The ICTA-UAB begins a scientific expedition in the Atlantic Ocean to collect dust and smoke samples from the fires of tropical Africa deposited in marine sediments.

What elements and characteristics should forests have to influence human health?

Despite the increasing interest of the scientific community and society towards the potential of forests as a source of human health, the existing scientific literature does not allow for a coherent relationship between the type of forest and different health variables.

Red coral effectively recovers in Mediterranean protected areas after decades of overexploitation

Protection measures of the Marine Protected Areas have enable red coral colonies (Corallium rubrum) to recover partially in the Mediterranean Sea, reaching health levels similar to those of the 1980s in Catalonia and of the 1960s in the Ligurian Sea (Northwestern Italy).

Sub-national “climate clubs” could offer key to combating climate change

‘Climate clubs’ offering membership for sub-national states, in addition to just countries, could speed up progress towards a globally-harmonised climate change policy, which in turn offers a way to achieve stronger climate policies in all countries.

El ICTA-UAB estrena su programa “Locos por la Tierra” de la Fundació Catalunya La Pedrera

Victoria Reyes-García receives an ERC Proof of Concept grant linked to the LICCI project

Victoria Reyes-García ICREA Research Professor at the Institute of Environmental Science and Technology of the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (ICTA-UAB) is one of the 76 top researchers that will receive ERC Proof of Concept grants.

ICTA-UAB demands the UAB to reduce number of flights

Given our current climate emergency, recently acknowledged by the UAB, the Institute of Environmental Science and Technology of the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (ICTA-UAB) has drawn up a proposal urging the University to put into action a new travel policy to tackle one of its most polluting activities: Flying.

New assessment finds EU electricity decarbonization discourse in need of overhaul

It’s well known that the EU is focusing its efforts on decarbonizing its economy.

Mining waste dumped into Portmán Bay continues to release metals into the sea 25 years later

The waters of the Mediterranean Sea continue to receive dissolved metals from the mining waste deposited in Portmán Bay (Murcia) 25 years after the cessation of mining activity.

A new ICTA-UAB project to assess the impacts of micro- and nano-plastics in the tropical and temperate oceans

A new project led by ICTA-UAB researcher Patrizia Ziveri is one of five projects selected for funding by the Joint Programming Initiative Healthy and Productive Seas and Oceans (JPI Oceans).

Excelencia María de Maeztu

Education

Master's Degree in Interdisciplinary Studies in Environmental, Economic and Social Sustainability

Master's Degree in Political Ecology. Degrowth and Environmental Justice

PhD in Environmental Science and Technology

Graduate Diploma in Promoting Agroecological Farming at the Local Level

Educational activities - postgraduates and summer courses

ICTA-UAB regulary offers additional training to its PhD students, and invites other doctoral students from abroad to participate in summer schools or advanced seminars on diferent topics that relate to our research areas and themes.

Educational activities - postgraduates and summer courses

Graduate Diploma in Promoting Agroecological Farming at the Local Level - http://www.uab.cat/web/postgraduate/graduate-diploma-in-promoting-agroecological-farming-at-the-local-level/general-information-1217916968009.html/param1-3258_en/param2-1998/

Introduction

The industrialisation of agricultural activity has had a great impact on the environment and society the world over. In Europe the result has been a profound degradation of natural resources, the landscape and rational agricultural ecosystems, along with a decline in farming's social and economic importance, which has led in turn to a decline in rural communities. These tendencies have not been reversed in the last decades by corrective policies on agriculture and rural development, focusing on post-productivism and the multifunctionality of agriculture.

Agroecology arose in Latin America as a compendium of science and folk knowledge, in response to the symptoms of social and environmental crisis linked to changes in the agrofood system. Although Latin America has considerable experience in this area, attempts to adapt agroecology to Europe have mainly relied on theoretical approaches.

Agroecology has three different dimensions: the environmental-productive dimension, the socio-economic and cultural dimension and the socio-political dimension. In Europe, the incipient empirical experiments and applied research carried out have focused mainly on two of these dimensions: on the one hand, on aspects of single farm production (environmental-productive dimension), and on the other hand, on characterising the expansion of agroecology as a social movement (socio-political dimension of agroecology).

However, the socio-economic and cultural dimension of agroecology has hardly been developed, beyond a few incursions into rural restructuring processes (or deagrarianisation) and the growing role of farming activity as a stimulus for territorial and social cohesion in peri-urban areas.

This dimension (socio-economic and cultural) includes all factors related to the building of local networks and alternative food production; the recovery of folk knowledge about the environment; access to the means of production (especially land, water,energy, genetic resources and financial resources); policies on agriculture and rural development; the role of agricultural activity in peri-urban areas of the major metropolitan regions; and the recovery of self-esteem in rural and agricultural life, as part of the construction of symbolic contexts that are favourable to agroecology.

These problems are likely to persist in the future in rural areas and this, together with the ever-increasing importance of social and environmental sustainability in land-use planning and public policy on rural areas, highlights the importance of training courses like the one presented here. Meanwhile, the growing importance of agroecology and the proposals on rural agro-ecological development in the next implementation period of the EU Common Agricultural Policy (2014-2020) justify the need to train up professionals to implement this approach in land-use policies for urban and peri-urban areas and in rural development policies.

Access requirements

- Bachelor's degree of 180 ECTS minimum, or equivalent.

- Access to this course will also be considered for candidates who do not have the above qualifications, for example, if they have sufficient proven professional experience in the sector. On passing the course, these students will receive a certificate of attendance only.

Career opportunities

- Local government officers in rural and peri-urban areas, working mainly in employment, land-use planning, environment, crop and livestock farming, food supplies, etc.
- Regional or national government officers working in crop and livestock farming, rural development, or protected natural spaces.
- Private-sector consultants on sustainable rural development.
- Businesses involved in Social Economics, in particular, ecological agriculture and sustainable rural environment.
- Research in agroecology and sustainable rural development.
- Civil society agencies involved in agroecology and sustainable rural development.